A policeman and two residents look at the water and mud that blocked the traffic at Mayu Bridge in Mentougou district during the July 21 rainstorm. Photo: Li Hao/GT



Despite widely reported predictions of doom, the world did not end on December 21 as the Mayan calendar ended a 5,125-year-long cycle.

However, for many Beijingers the year had an apocalyptic flavor.

The rainstorm on July 21 was the biggest to hit the city in six decades. The storm claimed 79 lives, and cost 11.64 billion yuan ($1.82 billion).

The storm not only tested Beijing's drainage system in coping with heavy rain, but also rescuers' readiness to aid people that are caught in floods. A 34-year-old driver died in his car that was submerged in 4 meters of water on the main road under Guangqumen Bridge on July 21.

After the storm, the city was haunted by increasing numbers of sinkholes and building collapses.

On July 31, a car was almost consumed by a sinkhole on Zhongkou Hutong, Xicheng district. Two hours later, a man was injured after falling into a hole on Baiyun Lu, Xicheng district. On August 1, the sidewalk collapsed on Huajiadi Dajie, Chaoyang district, leaving a 10-meter-wide and 2-meter-deep hole.

Beijing had at least 18 road collapses in the last 10 days of July, the government said.

Following summer's rainstorm, winter's snow came early, on November 3. In Yanqing county, the snow left 57 villages without power and affected over 7,000 people.

Beijing also saw the coldest weather in 10 years after the temperature dropped to -13.7 C on the morning of December 24. (Temperatures did not drop to the forecast -15 C, which would have been the coldest in 30 years.)

Zhang Fanghua, chief forecaster at the National Meteorological Center, clarified that the sharp temperature drop had nothing to do with the rumors of doomsday. At least three residents died from the cold weather, and at least 7 people passed away from carbon monoxide poisoning caused by coal heaters.

Residents in Shijingshan district were puzzled by a five-minute-long mysterious "sonic rumble" that shook the area on November 27. The source of the sound was not uncovered by local governments that day.

But the mystery was eventually solved. "We stopped the investigation of the sound after learning from the Internet that it was caused by an aerospace test in the Sixth Academy of China Aerospace Science & Industry Corp in Yungang," an officer surnamed Song from the Shijingshan district publicity bureau told the Global Times.

According to xilu.com, the academy, less than 30 kilometers from Shijingshan, tested the engine of a new-generation small rocket on November 27, which explained the sound heard by residents that day.