TOPSHOT - Flooded buildings are seen in Congjiang, in Chinas southwest Guizhou province on June 24, 2025. Severe flooding in China's southwestern province of Guizhou has forced more than 80,000 people to flee their homes, Beijing's state media said on June 25. (Photo by AFP) / China OUT
Flooding in the country’s southwest has driven more than 80,000 people from their homes, state media said, as a collapsed bridge forced the dramatic rescue of a truck driver left dangling over the edge.
China is enduring a summer of extreme weather, with heat waves scorching wide swaths of the country while rainstorms pummel other regions.
Around 80,900 people had been evacuated by Tuesday afternoon in the southwestern province of Guizhou, state news agency Xinhua reported.
In Rongjiang county, a football field was “submerged under 3m of water”, Xinhua said.
Footage from state broadcaster CCTV showed severe flooding has inundated villages and collapsed a bridge in one mountainous area of the province.
Rescuers pushed boats carrying residents through murky, knee-high water and children waited in a kindergarten as emergency personnel approached them, the footage showed.
“The water rose very quickly,” resident Long Tian told Xinhua.
“I stayed on the third floor waiting for rescue. By the afternoon, I had been transferred to safety.”
A team was also seen preparing a drone to deliver supplies including rice to flood victims.
In a video circulated by local media, truck driver You Guochun recounted his harrowing rescue after he ended up perched over the edge of a broken bridge segment.
“A bridge collapsed entirely in front of me,” he said.
“I was terrified.”
Floods have also hit the neighbouring Guangxi region, with state media publishing videos of rescuers there carrying residents to safety.
Tens of thousands of people were evacuated last week in the central Chinese province of Hunan due to heavy rain.
Nearly 70,000 people in southern China were relocated days earlier after heavy flooding caused by Typhoon Wutip. — AFP
