💦Beijing Gets a Wet Blast From the Past: Historic Rain and Unexpected Visitors! 🚣♂️
TL;DR: 😲 Beijing just had its most intense rain shower in 140 years, thanks to Typhoon Doksuri’s leftover party vibes. Result? Streets turned into waterways, power outages, and 21 people tragically lost their lives.
Hey Turnt Up News enthusiasts! Remember when we thought 2021 was wild? Well, Mother Nature’s saying, “Hold my drink.” 🍹
For the residents of Beijing, this past week felt like they’d boarded a time machine straight back to the 1880s. Why, you ask? 🤔 They’ve just experienced the heaviest rainfall they’ve had in AT LEAST 140 years. So, was it just a sprinkle? Nah, it poured down a whopping 29.3 inches between Saturday and Wednesday, according to those rain-watchers over at the Beijing Meteorological Bureau.
So, with all this water, Beijing essentially transformed into the Venice of the East. 🛶 Streets turned into canals, and if you owned a rubber boat, you were the new local superhero. And by superhero, we mean the brave emergency crews who were out there saving stranded residents. Applause for them! 👏
The sad flip side to this aquatic adventure? Twenty-one souls tragically lost their lives due to the deluge, including one particularly valiant rescuer, Wang Hong-chun. Big salute to Wang, who battled the waters with her team when their rubber boat got flipped by the raging river. Four of her teammates lived to tell the tale. And let’s not forget the 26 who are still MIA. Where are they? 🧐
Zhuozhou, our neighboring city close to Beijing, took one of the hardest hits. So much so that the local police had to send out an SOS on social media asking for lights to help with the rescue work. Just imagine that – an entire city in the dark, people trapped in their homes with no water, gas, or electricity since Tuesday afternoon. And here we were complaining about our WiFi dropping out for five minutes!
But, like always, amidst the chaos, humanity shines through. 🌟Rescue teams, armed with their trusty rubber boats, went door-to-door, or should we say, “window-to-window”, getting residents to safety. Props to them!
But, for real though, as we send our thoughts to everyone affected, it gets us thinking… are we really prepared for what our planet throws at us? 💭 And as we continue to dance this tango with Mother Nature, one’s gotta ask: What’s our next move? How do we step up and adapt to these ever-changing rhythms? 🌍🤷♂️