Fierce winds, pounding rain and high seas battered Hong Kong on Wednesday as Super Typhoon Ragasa headed into southern China after causing a lake burst that killed at least 14 people in Taiwan.

The Chinese finance hub saw scores of fallen trees and flooding in multiple neighbourhoods, with the storm surge smashing the glass doors of an upscale hotel and flooding its lobby, according to footage circulated online.

Ragasa is churning away from Hong Kong gradually around noon (0400 GMT) but the city will still be lashed by hurricane-force winds, according to the Hong Kong Observatory, which issued the highest level of typhoon warning overnight.

Ragasa has brought “significant storm surge”, with waters at coastal areas rising more than three metres above the reference level, the observatory

See Full Page