About 260,000 people have been waiting to board trains at Guangzhou railway station [AFP]

About 260,000 people wanting head home for the Lunar New Year holiday have besieged Guangzhou station waiting for days to travel.
 
Li Hongxia, a watch factory worker trying to get home to Hubei province, in central China was crushed in the stampede to get on a train.

'The worst is perhaps over for the hardest hit of southern China in the worst snowfall in 54 years, the news people are saying.'  MWC News James Secor in Shaoxing said.

"For 9-10 days, people in some cities in Hunan province have been without power. The railway has opened a track for transport of coal, 13,000 cars/day, from as far north as Inner Mongolia." he said.

Another woman was quite badly injured in the crush.

Passenger backlog

Authorities in Guangzhou said that their priority was to clear the backlog of thousands of people still waiting at the railway station, having encouraged many others to skip what for many is their only chance of the year to visit family.

However, Wang Yongping, ministry of railways spokesman, was reported by Xinhua new agency as saying that it was simply not possible for everyone to make their journeys after so many delays and cancellations.

"The railways can't go beyond their capacity to meet everyone's need," he said. "We have to say sorry to those who couldn't get tickets."

Security cordons

Passengers at the station said police and soldiers added more of cordons on Sunday to hold back the swarming crowds. Xinhua reported that  12,000 security personnel.

Heavy snowfalls have disrupted China's power supplies [AFP]

Meanwhile, Wen Jiabao, the Chinese premier, urged people to be brave as the blizzards and freezing temperatures continued to disrupt power supplies.

"We have the faith, courage and ability to overcome" he said in radio address from on board a train in China's southern Hunan province.

Heavy snowfalls have toppled power lines and the chaos on the rail network has held up thousands of coal trains.

On Sunday, fog caused further misery in parts of Hunan, delaying flights and bringing road traffic to a standstill, Xinhua said. In the capital city of Changsha, visibility was reduced to 50 metres.   

At least 60 people have died because of the atrocious weather conditions, most of them in traffic accidents.

Recommend this article...

Did you enjoy this article? Please bookmark it onto: