Less than a month after 70 people were killed by floods and landslides in north and central Vietnam, another natural disaster has struck the country, causing at least 61 more deaths, Reuters reports.
Vietnam officials said flooding from Typhoon Damrey could intensify because dams are full and some water may need to be let out, according to reports. Al Jazeera reports that the flooding is the worst to hit the southern coast of the country “in decades.”
With a long coastline, Vietnam is prone to flooding and extreme weather events. Last year, more than 200 were killed from extreme weather events, and this year that number has already surpassed 240, according to Al Jazeera.
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The storm hit just before Vietnam is expected to host the Asia Pacific Economic Conference summit on Nov. 11-12 for the country’s second time ever. Each year, APEC brings together political and business leaders from 21 countries, including Canada, Australia, and the United States, to discuss economic development.
The damage to central Vietnam is extensive. According to the Reuters report, 2,000 homes collapsed, 80,000 were damaged, and 7,000 farm animals were killed. Twenty-eight people are still missing.
According to the Environmental Justice Foundation, an estimated 27 million people are displaced by extreme weather events every year around the world. A 2016 report from the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters and the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction found that climate-change-related disasters cause an estimated $250 billion in damages per year.
In Vietnam alone, 13,000 people have been killed by extreme weather events in the past 20 years, according to acting country director for the World Bank in Vietnam, Achim Fock, making it the world’s 7th most vulnerable to natural disasters. The country has also sustained more than $6 billion in property damages over that time.
Read More: Climate Change Could Push 720 Million People Into Extreme Poverty: Report
In Vietnam’s Khanh Hoa province, which was one of the hardest hit by the most recent storm, an estimated 30,000 people were evacuated over the past week. Additionally, train and plane service was suspended in some locations and some areas experienced blackouts, according to reports.
In the wake of the storm, the Vietnam government has called on soldiers and villagers to clean up a beach resort in Danang in advance of the APEC summit.
“If anyone from APEC comes to see [Hoi An] and sees the condition it’s in at the moment — it’s dreadful,” one villager told AFP.