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Typhoon Pulasan floods Shanghai


Buildings are silhouetted as clouds drift past the sun in Shanghai on Sept. 17, 2024.
Buildings are silhouetted as clouds drift past the sun in Shanghai on Sept. 17, 2024.

Roads and neighborhoods in Shanghai flooded on Friday as the Chinese megacity was battered by a second typhoon days after it was hit by its strongest storm in 75 years.

Typhoon Pulasan made landfall Thursday night in the city's Fengxian district, with a maximum wind speed of 83 kph, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency.

The storm "is forecast to gradually weaken as it moves inland," Xinhua said, though downpours continued in the city Friday morning.

Video posted on social media Friday showed Shanghai residents wading through calf-deep water in some neighborhoods, though no severe damage or casualties have been reported.

Parts of Shanghai upgraded their typhoon alert levels as the storm approached the city Thursday.

Pulasan comes days after Typhoon Bebinca wreaked havoc Monday as the strongest storm to hit the city since 1949.

Bebinca felled more than 1,800 trees and left 30,000 households without electricity, with authorities evacuating more than 400,000 people across Shanghai ahead of the storm.

Scientists say climate change driven by greenhouse gas emissions is making extreme weather more frequent and intense.

China is the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, though its per capita emissions pale in comparison to rival economic power the United States.

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