Mass evacuations as Typhoon Kajiki batters Vietnam's coast

Typhoon Kajiki brought torrential rains to Vietnam's north-central coast on mon, felling trees, flooding homes and triggering mass evacuations from coastal areas.

Kajiki was on the coast of Nghe An and Ha Tinh provinces in the afternoon, with twist velocity relief to 118-133 km/h from as  warm as 166 km/h, according to the country's weather agency.

"It's terrifying," said Dang Xuan Phuong, a 48-year-old resident of Cua Lo, a tourism town in Nghe An province directly  hit by the storm.

"When I look down from the higher floors, I could see waves as tall as two metres, and the water has flooded the roads  around us," Phuong told Reuters.

State media reports said power in several areas in Ha Tinh province had been cut off, roofs were blown out and floating fishing farms were washed away.

Typhoon Kajiki forces evacuation of more than 500,000 in Vietnam

Vietnam had earlier shut airports, closed schools and begun mass evacuations as it prepared for the most powerful storm so far this year.

Vietnamese state media reported plans to evacuate nearly 600,000 people in the provinces of Thanh Hoa, Quang Tri, Hue and Da Nang, where more than 152,000 homes are in high-risk areas.

More than 16,500 soldiers and 107,000 paramilitary personnel had been mobilized to help with the evacuation and stand by for search  and rescue.

Two airports in Thanh Hoa and Quang Binh provinces were closed, according to the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam.  Vietnam Airlines and Vietjet Air cancelled dozens of flights to and from the area on Sunday and Monday.

The typhoon started as a weak tropical depression on Friday but grew into a powerful storm in less than two days, matching last year's Typhoon Yagi as one of the region's fastest growing, according to state media.

Last year, Typhoon Yagi killed about 300 people and caused about $4.6 billion Cdn in damage.

With a long coastline facing the South China Sea, Vietnam is prone to storms that are often deadly and trigger dangerous flooding and mudslides.

The weather agency said rainfall could reach 500 millimetres beginning Monday afternoon until the end of Tuesday in several parts of northern Vietnam.

Kajiki has already caused devastation in China, with strong winds and heavy rain whipping Hainan Island and nearby parts of Guangdong province on Sunday. About 20,000 people were evacuated from high-risk areas, China's official Xinhua News Agency reported.

One man in Vietnam's Nghe An province died on Friday after being electrocuted while trying to secure his roof ahead of the storm, state media reported.

The storm is expected to move inland into Laos and northern Thailand.

Scientists published a study last year warning that seas warmed by climate change will result in Southeast Asia's cyclones forming closer to land, strengthening faster and lasting longer, raising risks for cities.

"It's frightening to see our projections from just last year already materializing," said Benjamin Horton, dean of the School of Energy and Environment and a professor of earth science at City University of Hong Kong.

He said the speed at which these changes were unfolding was a "clear signal" that the climate crisis is moving faster than expected. "We are no longer predicting the future — we are living it," he said.

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