Typhoon lashes China, sinks boats

In this story: Storm could gain speed Seeking aid RELATED STORIES, SITES

From staff and wire reports

SHANGHAI, China -- Despite losing speed as it inched toward the Korean Peninsula, Typhoon Saomai bore down on coastal China with such force that it sank boats carrying oil and toxic chemicals.

Chinese officials and state media reported Friday that Saomai's heavy winds were responsible for the sinking of an oil tanker and a small boat transporting Freon. No casualties were reported.

More than 45,000 residents of Ningbo, a port city in southeastern China, and outlying Zhoushan Island evacuated their homes as Saomai delivered heavy rains and winds gusting to 160 kilometers (100 miles) per hour.

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Officials reported that more than 700 houses collapsed in the region, and that 10 fishing boats collided in the heavy winds off Zhoushan Island.

Meanwhile, state media reported that the storm forced an Air France Airbus A340 to skid off a runway at Hongqiao airport in Shanghai, a city of nearly 13 million in southeastern China.

Storm could gain speed

While there were no reports of injuries, officials had closed the airport for several hours, both China Daily and China Central Television reported.

As Saomai's outer feeder bands lashed China, the storm was moving northeasterly at 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) per hour toward the Korean Peninsula. South Korea had reported cloud cover and stormy weather by Friday.

CNN weather forecaster Guillermo Arduino said Saomai was approximately 500 kilometers (310 miles) south of Cheju, an island in South Korea, by Friday afternoon.

He said Saomai -- which had been traveling at 15 kilometers (nine miles) earlier in the week -- could regain some of its speed.

However, Arduino said the storm's winds were expected to diminish by approximately 10 kilometers (six miles) every 12 hours. He said it was difficult to predict the amount of rainfall the region would receive.

Seeking aid

The storm's interaction with cooler waters and land as it reached South Korea would cause Saomai to lose strength, and eventually be downgraded to a tropical storm, Arduino said.

Elsewhere in Asia, unprecedented flooding caused by heavy rainfalls since July has claimed approximately 100 lives -- more than 80 in Cambodia and eight in Vietnam -- and forced the evacuation of 600,000 people in Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos.

Thousands of houses were flooded in Vietnam's Dong Thap and Long An provinces, which border Cambodia, when the Mekong River overflowed, turning vast areas of rice fields into lakes.

Officials from the Red Cross and Red Crescent agencies appealed this week for $1.13 million in international aid -- saying $904,000 was needed for Cambodia.

The aid workers said 600,000 people needed emergency assistance -- such as clothes, food, plastic sheets and blankets -- in Cambodia and Vietnam.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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