Hong Kong paralyzed by flash flooding after heaviest rainfall since 1884 | CNN
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Record-breaking rainfall in Hong Kong caused widespread flash flooding across the financial hub on Friday, with many businesses and schools forced to shut, just days after the city was battered by a typhoon.

Record-breaking rainfall paralyzed much of Hong Kong on Friday, with flash flooding submerging metro stations and trapping drivers on roads, as authorities suspended schools and urged the public to seek safe shelter.

Photos and videos showed residents wading through murky brown floodwaters as heavy rain continued to fall. In some low-lying areas, streets were transformed into surging torrents, with authorities forced to rescue motorists stuck in their vehicles.

The deluge began late Thursday night, with the Hong Kong Observatory recording more than 158 millimeters (6.2 inches) in rain between 11 p.m. and midnight, the highest hourly rainfall since records began in 1884, the government said in a news release.

Some parts of the densely populated city of 7.5 million saw almost 500 mm (19.7 inches) of rainfall in 24 hours, according to online weather data site OGimet.

    • Arn_Thor
      37·
      1 year ago

      The water management infrastructure is excellent. But it was designed to cope with century floods, not the kind that happen every other century.

      Edit: the drainage systems were in fact designed to cope with a once-in-200-years flood. But this was a 500 year flood. A quarter of Hong Kong’s annual rainfall poured down in a day—and this is a place with notorious rain storms through the summer

    • prenatal_confusion@lemmy.one
      111·
      1 year ago

      It’s all engineers to some limits that are expected. This was not within those limits.

      Same thing with Texas and the cold front. Of course Montreal could have dealt with that easily but they expect that sort of thing.

    • Astrealix@lemmy.world
      21·
      1 year ago

      I have never seen the city like this; I’m glad I’m not there rn. There are some rumours about how because the government sealed brick paths with glue following the protests the drainage is weaker, but idk how true that is

      • Arn_Thor
        3·
        1 year ago

        I’m sure that didn’t help but that’s a drop in the proverbial ocean. There have been many severe rainstorms since that happened and nothing like this occurred