12 die as heavy rains lash Nha Trang

By Xuan Ngoc   November 18, 2018 | 02:11 am PT
12 die as heavy rains lash Nha Trang
Four people are buried due to severe erosion in Vinh Truong Commune of Nha Trang. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Ngoc
At least 12 Nha Trang residents have died in heavy rains triggered by the Toraji storm turned tropical depression.

Khanh Hoa Province’s Steering Committee for Natural Disaster Prevention and Rescue reported that the major reason behind the fatalities is landslides due to downpours.

Several locations in Nha Trang resort town of the central coastal province of Khanh Hoa were flooded Sunday morning, stranding vehicles and forcing citizens to evacuate.

"Many other places in the city have experienced severe erosion because of the downpours," said Nguyen Sy Khanh, Vice Chairman of Nha Trang’s People’s Council.

Of the 12 fatalities, two people reportedly died as the wall of a pho noodle soup restaurant named Tien Huyen collapsed during heavy downpours Sunday.

Nguyen Thanh Huyen, owner of the restaurant on Ton That Tung Road, and an unnamed seven-year-old boy were buried in the rubble of the collapsed wall.

By the time the police managed to clear the rubble, both were dead.

The boy was part of a group of about 30 tourists coming from the Central Highlands’ Dak Lak Province to Nha Trang on Saturday, said Nguyen Khoa Giao, a fellow tourist in the group. Four other people from the group were also injured in the accident.

At least two people die as the wall of a restaurant collapsed. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Ngoc

At least two people die as the wall of Tien Huyen restaurant collapsed. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Ngoc

The National Highway 27 section from Nha Trang to the Central Highlands’ province of Lam Dong also suffered from erosion.

Heavy rains also rendered locations near National Highway 1A like Cam Ranh and Cam Lam District in Khanh Hoa Province heavily flooded, impeding traffic.

The railway running through Nha Trang and Cam Lam District was also flooded, forcing one train to stop at a station 12 kilometers away from the Nha Trang Station, stranding approximately 400 passengers.

Storm Toraji devolved into a tropical depression Sunday morning, according to the National Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting Center.

Its center was about 100km east-southeast of Phan Rang in the central province of Ninh Thuan and about 200km to the east-northeast of La Gi Town in the central province of Binh Thuan, carrying maximum wind speed of 60km/h.

Vietnam was struck by a record-breaking number of 16 tropical storms in 2017 that left 389 people dead or missing and injured 668 others, mostly in northern and central regions. The General Statistics Office (GSO) estimated damage at around VND60 trillion ($2.64 billion), 1.5 times the previous year’s figure.

In the first ten months of the year, natural disasters left 185 people dead or missing and injured 134 others, and cost the country more than VND8.8 trillion ($381 million), according to the GSO.

 
 
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