China: Storm Kaemi kills 18 people

Sixteen of the dead and all of the missing were in Jiangxi province, which is inland from coastal Fujian province, where Kaemi made landfall Tuesday as a typhoon, Xinhua said. It dissipated Wednesday but continued to shower the area with downpours.

Photo: China: Storm Kaemi kills 18 people

China: Storm Kaemi kills 18 people

The number of reported fatalities has increased by nine with the new death toll. It includes six who died after a torrent of water rushed down a mountainside in Jiangxi and inundated military barracks, Xinhua said. Some 38 people were missing in that incident, it said without giving more details.

Three more bodies were found in Shangyou, a county in Jiangxi, which has been hard-hit by the storm's heavy rains and winds, Xinhua said.

The state meteorological bureau said more rain was expected to lash southern China on Thursday, especially Fujian, Jiangxi and the inland province of Hunan, which was hardest-hit by Tropical Storm Bilis, the AP reports.

In Fujian, workers in Zhao'an county labored around the clock to fill a breach in a 200-meter-long (650-foot-long) levee that had threatened flooding in six villages with at least 20,000 residents.