At least 73 people have been killed, and scores more are still missing, after a typhoon swept south-east China during the weekend.
Typhoon Chebi killed nine people after wreaking havoc in Taiwan before making its way across the Taiwan Strait to hit Fujian Province, according to reports yesterday in Chinese state newspapers.
All but two of the mainland victims were killed in the Fujian capital of Fuzhou, where more than 80 people were still missing yesterday.
The other two were killed in the nearby city of Ningde, where four people are still missing. Some estimates put the value of the damage in Fujian Province at over $400 million.
The typhoon hit the coast on Saturday night and stayed over land for 10 hours before heading back out to sea and weakening.
Fujian provincial officials were still verifying reports of deaths and missing, and declined to comment on the figures reported by the China News Service.
Taiwan's coast guard found the bodies of four of 23 Chinese crew members of a Belize-registered vessel which went missing off southern Taiwan on Saturday. Four of the crew were rescued and taken to hospitals in Taiwan.
One surviving crewman, Mr Chen Lin (25), said the waves were as "tall as a mountain". Wearing a life vest, he had been drifting for one day when rescued by a passing ship.
His vessel had sent a distress signal before it went missing. It was carrying 5,700 tonnes of iron sand and was on its way to the southern Taiwan city of Tainan from the Chinese province of Fujian.
Coast guard and navy vessels and helicopters continued search for the 15 missing crew members yesterday.
The storm also killed five Taiwan nationals. Four men drowned after falling into the sea, while another fell from the balcony of his second-floor home in the offshore island of Penghu.
China has been suffering from two extremes of weather in recent weeks. The north of the country has been suffering from serious drought with 15 million people affected.