Snowfall overnight in much of northern China yesterday led to the closure of roads and the suspension of classes and rail transport, reported the website Notícias ao Minuto.
In Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan province, the red snow alert was in effect until mid-morning and schools were closed.
Zhengzhou airport was also closed until late yesterday morning. A total of 134 road sections in 12 provinces, including 95 highways, were closed in the early morning due to snowfall and ice formation, state television CCTV reported.
Several trains in two parts of Shanxi province were suspended. It was the first significant snowfall this year in much of China, except in mountainous areas and the northeast, near the border with Siberia. A thin layer of snow covered rooftops and parked cars in central Beijing.
The roads were almost completely clear in the early followingnoon and workers were sweeping the snow that remained on the sidewalks. The Beijing Public Transport Group reported that 187 bus routes were suspended this morning.
Some metro lines added more trains during rush hour, CCTV said.
Between 7pm on Sunday (12pm on Sunday in Angola) and 6am today (11pm on Sunday in Angola), an average of 5.1 millimeters of snow fell in the Chinese capital.
The country’s meteorological authorities also issued a blue alert for the cold wave, the lowest of four levels, and ordered local governments to take precautions.
According to the local press, the snowfall also resulted in the cancellation of 59 flights in Beijing this morning. Snowfall caused a chain accident on a highway in Xinzhou prefecture, in Shanxi province (northern), which left at least one dead and six injured.
In the northeast, in the province of Heilongjiang, temperatures are expected to reach minus 30 degrees in the coming days, according to the official Chinese news agency Xinhua.
