© XinhuaA snow grader clears a path on a dangerous road in Nanzhang county, Hubei province.
Heavy snowfall in China continued to wreak havoc on Monday, damaging houses, agriculture and power facilities, with authorities saying
21 people have been killed and millions hit in the last one week.
The provinces that have been badly hit by the weather are Anhui, Henan, Jiangsu, Hubei, Hunan, Shaanxi, Shanxi and Chongqing Municipality, the China National Commission for Disaster Reduction said.
More than 3,700 people have been relocated and 14,000 are in need of emergency assistance, said the commission, noting that over
700 houses had collapsed and nearly 2,800 were damaged, state-run
Xinhua news agency reported.
The weather has affected more than 2,33,100 hectares of farmland, with more than 8,100 hectares destroyed, causing direct economic losses of 5.55 billion yuan ($854 million), it said.
Nineteen expressways in northeast Liaoning province have been closed or controlled since the snow started last night, according to local transport authorities.
Comment: See also this report concerning a similar situation at ski resorts in Italy and France: Heavy snowfall in Alpine regions leaves 30,000 skiers stranded