Shanghai recorded the lowest temperature of this winter on Feb. 13, 2008, the first official working day of Chinese New Year. Good news is that the weather in most places of South China (except southwest China) is getting better and better. According to news reported at 10 a.m. on Feb. 13 by National Transportation Department, no traffic jams on freeways across the country. Here are some numbers about this freezing rain (aka. ice rain) natural disaster reported by Xihuanet (I pulled out the numbers from here and here).
8 people are missing.
107 people died.
21 Provinces were suffered.
354,000 houses clasped.
1,512,000 people were re-settled.
1,927,000 people were helped out from blocked vehicles and trains /train stations.
22.12 million households (93% of total of those lost electricity ) regained electricity by Feb. 11, 2008.
13.98 million RMB is granted by the government.
11.95 million RMB is donated.
1 billion RMB is compensated by insurance industry. [this could be the costliest catastrophe for the insurance industry in China ever.]
111.1 billion RMB is direct loss. [21,000 billion RMB is the total GDP of China in 2006]
I have thought the disaster was caused by snowstorm which made me feel a little guilty in celebrating snow in Shanghai. But later I found out that it is a similar disaster as the one happened in Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick for 6 days in January 1998, when freezing rain coated everything 7-11 cm (3-4 in) of ice. Blame the ice not the snow. Here are some images collected the images from the web. that record this historical natural disaster. [keywords: 冻雨，冰灾，冻灾]
WOW how nice to see in person such wonders on earth.