Heavy rain and flooding in northern China have killed four people while several others remain missing, officials said Monday, as the region including the capital, Beijing, braced for more rainfall overnight. The victims were caught in a landslide in a rural part of Luanping county in Hebei province near Beijing, according to state broadcaster CCTV. Eight people were missing. A resident told the state-backed Beijing News that communications were down and he couldn’t reach his relatives. In Beijing, heavy flooding washed away cars and downed power poles in Miyun district, which borders Luanping county. Uprooted trees lay in piles with their bare roots exposed in the town of Taishitun, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) northeast of central Beijing. Streets were covered with water, with mud left higher up on the wall. “The flood came rushing in, just like that, so fast and suddenly. In no time at all, the place was filling up,” said Zhuang Zhelin, who was clearing mud with his family from their building materials shop. Next door, Zhuang’s neighbor Wei Zhengming, a traditional Chinese medicine practitioner, was shoveling mud in his clinic; his feet in slippers were covered in mud.

Full report : Heavy rains in northern China kill 4 as Beijing and nearby areas brace for more.