Rainstorm kills 12 in SW China's Mianning county

A rainstorm lashing Mianning county in Liangshan Yi autonomous prefecture in Sichuan province has caused the deaths of 12 people, while 10 people were reported missing.

The rainstorm started at 6 pm on Friday and ended at 1 am on Saturday, causing two deaths after a lower part of an expressway collapsed and one car and one minivan fell into a river.

The third death was reported in a village in the county's Yihai town, according to the county information office.

It said 420 police officers, firefighters, militia members and medical workers were involved in disaster relief and four centralized resettlement sites had accommodated more than 2,100 people affected by the rainstorm.

Sheltering in one of the four resettlement sites, Ah Limo, a 13-year-old girl, said she was terrified by the thunder on Friday evening.

"It was terrible. The thunder was so terrible," the Yi resident of Caogu village in Yihai town said.

At 6 pm on Friday, the rainstorm, with hailstones, hit the tiles of her house. About two hours later, the house lost power. She and her family members had to cuddle on a bed.

At 11 pm, a village official knocked at the door of her house and asked her family to flee a rainstorm-triggered flood.

Together with other residents of Caogu village, she ran to the former Caogu township government, which had been merged into Yihai town.

According to He Jianmei, deputy Party chief of Mianning, each resident of the four resettlement sites received two loaves of bread, a bag of milk and mineral water for supper on Saturday.

"Lunch boxes were distributed on Sunday," she said.