Emergency dredging work for parched Yangtze

Shanghai: These are torrid times for China's golden waterway, the Yangtze as a drought, on a scale rarely seen, has caused havoc throughout central China. So severe is the lack of water that central government has had to urgently redeploy a dredger to dig deeper channels. The Xinhua news agency says China's transport authorities have ordered the dredging of navigation channels in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River to ensure the safety of shipping as the water level falls to the lowest point in two decades. According to Xinhua, a large dredger has been withdrawn from an offshore construction site to dredge channels at Heishazhou (Blacksand Shoal), 40km upstream from Wuhu Bridge. China's longest river usually reaches its summer flood season in middle or late May, but this year the levels are abnormally low.  [05/06/07]