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BEIJING: The Chinese capital was in the grip of its coldest weather in 20 years Tuesday after snow storms caused chaos, while South Korea sent out an army of civil servants and soldiers to clear clogged roads.
China's national weather centre said the mercury dipped Tuesday to minus 15.6 degrees Celsius (four Fahrenheit) - the lowest in more than two decades, after Beijing was hit by its heaviest snowfall in 60 years at the weekend.
But air travel was back to normal at Beijing international airport following three days of flight cancellations and delays caused by the heavy snow and freezing temperatures, and schools were open again.
The freezing weather was expected to continue until Thursday for the Chinese capital, nearby Tianjin and Inner Mongolia, with temperatures forecast to fall as low as minus 32 degrees Celsius, the weather centre said on its website.
On the outskirts of Beijing, thousands of truck drivers were forced to sleep in their vehicles for two nights when snow made the road impassible and caused a 20-kilometre (12-mile) back-up, the state-run Beijing News reported.
Some drivers said they were afraid to sleep for fear of dying of exposure but others said they were prepared for the traffic snarl-up.
"We brought food as we expected the jam," said one trucker, who brought two cases of instant noodles and a thermos of water.
In Inner Mongolia, a train hit a wall of snow more than two metres (more than six feet) high on Sunday, leaving 1,400 travellers in the dark and without heating overnight before they could be evacuated, the China Daily said Tuesday.
"Though snow stopped yesterday, the temperature was minus 28 Celsius, freezing the doors," Zhang Jianwen, a police officer involved in the rescue effort, told the paper.
Nearly 2,000 people including police and local farmers dug out the train, which was heading from the city of Harbin to Baotou in Inner Mongolia, the report said.
Central China is under a snow storm warning until Wednesday, stretching from Henan to Hunan provinces, the weather bureau said.
In South Korea, tens of thousands of civil servants and soldiers were mobilised to clear record snowfalls as freezing temperatures left roads and highways icy in many areas.
Weathermen said it stopped snowing late Monday in Seoul and nearby areas but the southwest coast received up to 21 centimetres (about eight inches) of snow between late Monday and early Tuesday.
Almost 28 centimetres of snow fell in Seoul on Monday, the heaviest since records began in 1937, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration.
A man in his 50s fell to his death from the roof of a badminton court in Seoul while trying to clear snow on Monday, Yonhap news agency said.
In the central city of Cheongju, some 3,000 chickens perished as their coops collapsed under the weight of snow, it said.
In Seoul alone, about 48,000 people including civil servants and volunteers were mobilised to remove snow.
The defence ministry said 19,000 solders were deployed for snow clearing nationwide, while military helicopters carried blankets and food to isolated villages.
Cars crawled along icy roads as temperatures plunged to minus 10.4 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) in Seoul and minus 20.4 in Cheolwon, northwest of the capital.
A day after heavy snowfalls grounded many flights, service on international routes returned to normal Tuesday, but domestic air traffic and railway transportation remained crippled in some areas.
- AFP/yb
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