ANHUI, CHINA — Over the past week, severe flooding devastated central and southern China killing almost 130 people, destroying more than 1.9 million hectares of crops and led to direct economic losses of more than 38 billion yuan (US$5.7 billion).
During the storm, 92 alligators escaped from a local farm in Anhui province, the same area that houses the Anhui Research Center of Chinese Alligator Reproduction, the largest breeding center for 10,000 reptiles including the endangered Yangtze alligator species.
The escaped alligators swam over their enclosure walls when flood waters filled the pens. Authorities sent out a warning to locals and have taken measures to reinforce alligator pens at the center.
As of July 7, only eight of the alligators from the farm have been recaptured.
In another part of Anhui, 1,000 pigs were saved when their enclosures flooded earlier in the week. Among 3,000 pigs, only a third were mature enough to be slaughtered and therefore saved. The Xishang Group, the company that led the rescue, said the operation was quite expensive.
And the worst might not be over. Weather forecasts predicted more downpours during what is traditionally China’s flood season.
