Typhoon closes offices, cancels flights in Hong Kong
Tourists brave strong wind at the Victoria Peak in Hong Kong Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2013. The Observatory said Typhoon Utor intensified slightly as it moves towards the western coast of Guangdong. The typhoon battered the northern Philippines on Monday, toppling power lines and dumping heavy rain across cities and food-growing plains. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
HONG KONG >> Hong Kong has closed offices and transportation services as a typhoon passes by the Asian financial center.
The stock market in the southern Chinese territory was closed Wednesday morning. Flights were cancelled and bus and ferry services were curtailed as Typhoon Utor approached.
Winds gusted up to 139 kilometers an hour (86 miles an hour). The center of the storm was about expected to skirt around 250 kilometers (155 miles) southwest of Hong Kong before hitting southern China’s Guangdong province.
One person in Hong Kong was reported injured.
Some 94 flights at the city’s airport are cancelled while another 107 flights have been delayed.
Utor was this year’s strongest typhoon globally before it crossed the Philippines earlier this week. Six deaths occurred in the northern Philippines.
