100,000 Chinese evacuated as Yangtze River floods threaten World Heritage Site
- Floodwater rises above the toes of the Leshan Giant Buddha in Sichuan province for the first time in more than 70 years
- Water inflows at Three Gorges Dam expected to hit record highs on Wednesday
Staff, police and volunteers used sandbags to try to protect the 71 metre (233 feet) Leshan Giant Buddha in southwest China’s Sichuan province, as muddy floodwater rose over its toes for the first time since 1949, state broadcaster CCTV reported.
Sichuan, through which the Yangtze flows, raised its emergency response to the maximum level on Tuesday to cope with a new round of torrential rainfall.
The Yangtze Water Resources Commission, the government body that oversees the river, declared a red alert late on Tuesday, saying water at some monitoring stations was expected to exceed “guaranteed” flood protection levels by over five metres.
The Three Gorges Dam, a massive hydroelectric facility designed in part to tame floods on the Yangtze, is expected to see water inflows rise to 74,000 cubic metres per second on Wednesday, the highest since it was built, the Ministry of Water Resources said.
The project restricts the amount of water flowing downstream by storing it in its reservoir, which has been over 10 metres higher than its official warning level for more than a month.
The facility was forced to raise water discharge volumes on Tuesday to “reduce flood control pressures”, the water ministry said.
Authorities have been at pains to show that the cascade of giant dams and reservoirs built along the Yangtze’s upper reaches have shielded the region from the worst of the floods this year, though critics say they might be making things worse.
