Breitbart
Torrential rain hammered southern China’s Sichuan province over the weekend after several weeks of drought causing the region’s landscape to suffer flash flooding that forced the evacuation of nearly 50,000 people as of Sunday, China’s state-run Global Times reported.
“Heavy rain has hit seven cities and prefectures in Southwest China’s Sichuan Province since Saturday [August 27], including Chengdu, Guangyuan and Garze Tibetan Autonomous prefecture, forcing 46,400 people to evacuate overnight,” the newspaper reported on August 28.
Sichuan and most other southern Chinese provinces had suffered from a record-breaking heatwave since mid-June that caused region-wide drought conditions in recent weeks. Heavy rains following droughts have a propensity to cause flash flooding as the soil in a drought-affected region hardens during the dry spell and becomes less capable of absorbing rainwater.
“A drought hardens the ground. When it rains, it’s like pouring water on concrete,” U.S. Meteorologist Justin Ballard explained to the Florida Public Radio Emergency Network (FPREN) on August 12.
The Global Times acknowledged the link between Sichuan’s recent drought and its current flooding on Sunday.
