China's 'Hawaii' under water as tropical storm dumps record rainfall

For a third day, extreme rainfall pounded the southern Chinese province of Hainan, known as China's "Hawaii", amid the transit of yet another tropical cyclone, leaving the island half-submerged in a year of record-breaking wet weather.

Cities in Hainan, including Sanya, famed for its palm trees, seafront hotels and sandy beaches, remained waterlogged on Tuesday due to Tropical Storm Trami to the south. On Monday, Sanya logged 294.9mm of rainfall over a 24-hour window, the most for any day in October since 2000.

Trami made landfall in central Vietnam on Sunday after a slow trek across the South China Sea from the Philippines, where it left at least 125 people dead and 28 missing. While Hainan did not take a direct hit from Trami, Chinese authorities took no chances, recalling all fishing vessels and evacuating over 50,000 people.

China's entire eastern coastline has been tested by extreme weather events this year - from the violent passage of Super Typhoon Yagi across Hainan in September to the strongest tropical cyclone to strike Shanghai since 1949. Scientists warn more intense weather is in the offing, spurred by climate change.

"In October, the national average precipitation was 6.3% higher than the same period in previous years," Jia Xiaolong, a senior official at the National Climate Centre, said at a news conference on Tuesday.

Last week, the water along China's Bohai Sea inexplicably rose up to 160 cm in a matter of hours despite the absence of any wind, leading to a tidal surge that flooded the streets of Tianjin and many cities in the northern provinces of Hebei and Liaoning.