Emergency rescue underway in flood-hit villages of Hunan Province

Efforts to deliver emergency rations and relocate residents are continuing at a brisk pace, as torrential downpours lash Zixing City in central China's Hunan Province have triggered floods and led to power and telecommunications outages in mountainous regions.

Zixing City has been experiencing a record rainfall since last Friday due to the impact of Typhoon Gaemi, with 14 roads interrupted.

The Department of Emergency Management of Hunan Province dispatched four helicopters to transport relief supplies and transfer trapped injured residents.

By Tuesday afternoon, more than 130 flights had been completed by four helicopters, with over 30 tons of emergency supplies, such as rice, flour, cooking oil and quilts, delivered to flood-isolated villages, which can enable the daily living needs of 15,000 people for two days.

In addition to transport supplies to 33 villages in four towns, helicopters are also used to transfer the injured, with medical workers, stretchers and ambulances standing by at the temporary distributing center of supplies.

At present, 47 injured residents have been transferred by air.

When flying to the flood-isolated areas, helicopters have also carried more than 100 personnel including rescuers, firefighters and medical staff in batches, as part of the efforts to resume the normal production and living order of affected residents in the flood-hit villages as soon as possible.

As of 17:00 on Saturday, the average precipitation of Bamianshan Town in Zixing City had reached 498 millimeters. And the rain stopped basically on Sunday.

Torrential rains have not only damaged roads and washed away bridges, but also caused power and internet outages in the township nestled deep within mountains. And multiple rescue units consist of firefighters, armed police and volunteers had to walk into the disaster-hit areas.

As of Tuesday morning, 15 rescue units, with about 10 members in each, hiked through flooded areas to enter the 15 flood-isolated villages in Bamianshan as roads leading to the villages were severely damaged.

Currently, more than 200 residents have been relocated, with all of them well supplied. So far, 17 injured people in urgent need of medical treatment have been transferred and sent to hospitals.

Emergency rescue underway in flood-hit villages of Hunan Province

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠U.S. President Donald Trump's 25-percent car tariffs, which took effect on Thursday, have spurred confusion and concern in Canada's automotive capital of Windsor.

As the latest duties came into force, carmaker Stellantis, which owns marques including Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge, confirmed it will shut down its assembly plant in the Canadian border city of Windsor for two weeks starting April 7.

Fear and anxiety are running high among Stellantis workers.

"It's hard to comprehend at first and then it's hard to see where things are going to go from here. I think that everyone is hoping that it won't be long, but I have a feeling that it could be years," said a worker.

"Little nervous to be honest. Right now, with the way things are going over in the United States, it definitely affects us and if we're not selling cars, we're not going to have a job," another worker said.

Stellantis also announced it would pause production at a plant in Mexico, and temporarily lay off some 900 workers in Midwestern states of Michigan and Indiana. 

Experts warn that the tariffs will be likely to severely disrupt global supply chains and lead to production cutbacks and layoffs if they remain in place for any length of time. 

"If vehicle sales stall, manufacturing will stop. The car companies will not keep building cars if they can't sell them. They just can't do that, and they won't. So if they're not building cars, they will lay the workers off. This will snowball through the entire economy of the globe," said Peter Frise, a professor of automotive engineering at the University of Windsor.

On Thursday, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Canada will be responding by matching the U.S. approach with 25-percent tariffs on all vehicles imported from the United States that are not compliant with the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).

Canadian auto workers on edge following US tariffs