950826

Heavy rains hit South Korea - 36 killed,16 missing

SEOUL: At least 36 people have been killed and 16 reported missing as torrential rains lashed South Korea for a fourth day on Saturday with no sign of a let-up, emergency services officials said.

The National Disaster Centre said the death toll since heavy rains struck large parts of the country had risen to 36 with at least 16 reported missing and feared dead as of 4 p.m. (0700 GMT) on Saturday.

The latest confirmed victims were two people buried by a landslide in Kyongsang province in the southeast on Saturday, an official at the centre said.

Earlier in the day a 40-year-old woman died when her truck overturned in floods in the same province.

"More casualties are expected as downpours continue in some central areas," the official told Reuters.

There had been about 620 mm (25 inches) of rainfall recorded in Boryong county, 150 km (100 miles) southwest of Seoul, since early Wednesday, the centre said.

It said an average of more than 300 mm (12 inches) of rain had hit central areas.

Emergency services officials went on heightened alert as Typhoon Janis, moving northeast at 32 kph (20 mph), headed for a landfall on the west coast of the peninsula late on Saturday.

Weathermen predicted more flooding with Janis expected to dump up to 150 mm (six inches) of additional rain on central areas by Sunday, including the capital, Seoul.

They had forecast up to 250 mm (10 inches) of rainfall in those areas but later revised that figure downward as Janis was found to be weakening as it approached the peninsula.

The Han River Flood Control Centre has issued warnings against possible floods along the river, which bisects Seoul.

"We barely escaped floods along the river last night," an official at the centre said. "Flooding is unlikely but we are not completely safe yet, with the typhoon coming up."

The disaster centre official said police had set up roadblocks in more than 20 districts in the capital since late Friday, including on two main bridges over the Han River, causing extremely heavy rush-hour traffic.

The river overflowed in the summer of 1990 when heavy rainstorms caused extensive damage.

Dozens of schools in the central and eastern provinces of Chungchong and Kangwon were closed because of flooding.

More than 11,000 people in rain-stricken areas have been forced to evacuate their homes, the official said.

Traffic on five main railways had been cut by flooding but services on three of them were later restored, he said.

More than 1,000 houses and 16,400 hectares (40,500 acres) of farm land across the country were flooded, and 149 buildings destroyed.

Among the 36 known victims of the rains was a vendor killed on Friday when a train derailed on a bridge weakened by a rain-swollen river in the central town of Goisan, 110 km (70 miles) southeast of Seoul. The derailment injured 180 people, 20 seriously, the disaster centre official said.

All the other deaths over the past four days were caused by drowning or burial by landslide.-Reuter