Southern China is preparing for “super typhoon” Megi, which killed 19 people in the Philippines and is expected to hit the coastline east of Hong Kong on Saturday. Ports and oil terminals have shut down, hundreds of thousands of people have been evacuated, and thousands of fishing vessels have returned to port while tankers will be forced to ride out the typhoon offshore, Reuters reports. Megi’s winds are estimated at more than 108 miles per hour, but could get stronger.
“The storm surge could be so devastating that buildings, docks, villages, and cities could be destroyed by it,” says one expert. Adds a security official, “If we are hit directly it will cause a very serious impact to Hong Kong.”
(More Super Typhoon stories.)