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The China Meteorological Administration finally lowered its severe alert status Wednesday, after three weeks of devastating snow and stormy weather caused havoc in east, central and southern China.
The situation was beginning to stabilize as the Lunar New Year, China's most important holiday, dawned Thursday.
Reports on the snow disaster have been the chief focus of the media. From top officials in the Communist Party's Central Committee to local officials and grassroots people, as well as the People's Liberation Army, everyone has been at war against the heavy snow.
On the eve of the holiday, according to tradition, national leaders made visits to outlying parts of the country. This year they brought greetings to soldiers working on emergency relief and repairmen working on restoring electric lines, as well as visiting ordinary people in their homes.
President Hu Jintao visited the Zhuang Autonomous Region in the southern province of Guangxi, where residents remained without electricity and without telecommunications. Premier Wen Jiabao visited rural areas in the southwestern province of Guizhou and the city of Fuzhou in Jiangxi province, where electricity was expected to be restored Wednesday evening.
The premier had earlier visited badly hit areas of Guangdong and Hunan provinces, stopping at the Guangzhou railway station to apologize for the delayed trains. The station held as many as 180,000 people at one point. In Hunan, Wen paid his respects to three electricity repairmen who lost their lives while trying to restore fallen power lines. Other top Chinese leaders also visited the snow-hit areas.
All China could be said to be affected, but the provinces of Guangdong, Anhui, Hunan, Hubei, Guizhou, Henan and Jiangxi in south and southeast China have been most seriously hit. The bad weather has caused dozens of deaths, the collapse of buildings, the downing of power lines and the blockage of roads and railroads.
Some cities and counties have faced blackouts for up to 20 days, bringing normal activities to a halt in those areas. The power outages were caused by the collapse of electricity towers under heavy snow, or the downing of ice-encrusted power lines.
The heavy snows also caused the collapse of transportation networks, especially the railways, which were clogged with passengers trying to get home for Thursday's holiday. Tens of thousands of people spent days jammed together in railway stations, mostly in the south and southeast. Some trains were halted in mid-journey, waiting for electric signals to be repaired or tracks to be cleared.
Flight schedules were disrupted as well, causing pile-ups at airports. On Saturday the national television station, CCTV, reported that airports across the country were closed, and 4,000 flights canceled or delayed.
The situation has also caused health breakdowns and huge psychological strain. Some travelers who became ill were unable to get timely treatment due to clogged traffic or broken communication networks. In one instance, passengers at the airport in Guangzhou nearly rioted after waiting hours for their flights, chanting loudly, "We want to go home!"
The Lunar New Year is the one time of the year when families go to all lengths to be together. Unfortunately, this year many people were unable to get home in time, and are spending the festival on trains, or still trapped in railway stations, airports or cities far from home. Many others are celebrating the festival in a blackout. It is the most unfortunate timing for such a disaster to hit the nation.
However, this unexpected storm may have provided the Chinese government with lessons that can be applied in the future. Particularly the collapse of the power networks has stressed the need for quality control in all infrastructure related to the power supply.
