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Flood leaves 2 dead, 2 missing in SW China city

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2011-06-24 13:57

BEIJING - Two people were killed and two others were missing in a rain-triggered flood in southwest China's Chongqing municipality as of 9 pm Thursday, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

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The flood also forced 109,000 people to evacuate from their homes to safer grounds and toppled 5,600 rural houses across the mega Chinese city, said the ministry, citing figures reported by the municipal civil affairs bureau of Chongqing.

The rain-triggered flood also caused damage in other 13,000 houses, and an estimated 780 million yuan ($120 million) in direct economic losses.

The ministry, together with the National Disaster Reduction Commission, started a level-4 emergency response Thursday night by sending a special  work team to Chongqing to gauge the damage and direct the disaster relief operation there, according to a notice issued by the ministry Friday.