Severe floods are expected on China's Yangtze River this year due to a strong El Nino weather pattern, raising the risk of deaths and damage to property and crops along the country's longest waterway, AP cited state media as saying. The El Nino conditions are the strongest since records collection began in 1951, and resemble a 1998 weather pattern that flooded the river and killed thousands, the official Xinhua news agency said on Friday, citing vice minister of water resources, Liu Ning. "Precipitation in the upper, middle and lower reaches of the river is forecast to be as much as 80 percent more than normal from May to August," Xinhua said. Some Yangtze tributaries had already begun flooding and the flood control and drought relief situation was "extremely severe", Liu said, according to the news agency. Provinces and cities along the river needed to make contingency plans, Xinhua cited Wang Guosheng, the governor of central Hubei province, as saying.
