People are cleaning up in China’s southern city of Guangzhou after a tornado struck at the weekend killing at least five people and injuring dozens more.

Aerial photos published by state media showed the scale of the devastation after the tornado tore through several communities in Guangzhou’s Baiyun district on Saturday afternoon during a thunderstorm.

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The images showed block upon block of devastation in the hardest-hit areas with a few clusters of buildings standing amid the destruction, a truck overturned on its side and cars crushed by rubble. The sheet metal roofs on some buildings had been torn off.

The tornado emerged during a major storm that brought strong winds and hail [Douyin@Antique via AP Photo]

The extreme weather was the latest to hit China’s industrial heartland after torrential rain last week caused serious flooding and killed four people in Guangdong, China’s most populous province. The area is home to 127 million people and thousands of factories that power the country’s export sector.

At least 33 people were injured and some 141 factories damaged in Saturday’s tornado, Xinhua reported.

Such weather systems are not unusual in China.

In September, 10 people were killed after a tornado struck Suqian, Jiangsu Province, in the country’s east.

In 2021, two tornadoes struck the country in one day, killing 12, including eight in the central city of Wuhan.