The water level of the Mentougou section of the Yongding River rises due to persistent rainfall in recent days in Mentougou district of Beijing, July 31, 2023.  Photo: China News Service/Tian Yuhao

As Beijing is struck by the heaviest rain in decades for consecutive days, its surrounding regions including North China's Hebei Province and Tianjin Municipality are also experiencing disasters caused by the heavy rainfall.

At 1 pm on Tuesday, Tianjin upgraded its flood control level-III emergency response to a level-I. Hebei on Monday afternoon initiated a level-IV provincial natural disaster relief emergency response plan, while continuing to issue an orange warning for heavy rain.

The maximum cumulative rainfall has reached 1,000 mm in Xingtai, Hebei, which is considered extreme, according to National Meteorological Center (NMC) chief forecaster Fang Chong.

In a normal year, the total yearly precipitation in Xingtai is around 500 mm. Currently, within two days, the rainfall has been the equivalent of two years of total precipitation in a normal year, Fang said.

Zhuozhou is another Hebei city severely affected by the rain. According to help forms circulated online, many residents and villagers have lost their cell phone connection .

Shao Jun, a member of the Blue Sky Rescue Team, a Chinese civil relief squad, in Zhuozhou told the Global Times on Tuesday afternoon that he had received more than 300 requests for help from Zhuozhou. And he is just one of several team members responsible for receiving the help messages.

More than 100 people were trapped in a residential neighborhood near a river in Zhuozhou, Hebei on Monday night. One of the trapped residents said the water was already up to the ceiling of the first floor, China News Weekly reported.

Several stranded residents told China News Weekly that the water level rose in the afternoon and evening at a rate of about 15 cm per hour. One resident said the fastest rise was 40 cm in an hour, but that the water level stopped rising on Monday night.

The Zhuozhou Emergency Management Bureau said Monday night they had received distress messages from the neighborhood, but rescue efforts were complicated by the weather, according to China News Weekly.

Another neighborhood in Zhuozhou has also seen floodwaters inundate the area, guancha.cn reported on Tuesday.

A video showed that the parking lot of a building in the neighborhood had collapsed, while rainwater continued to pour in, already flooding some of the lower floors. Residents calling for help say the neighborhood has lost water and power, and that they've been trapped for 20 hours.

Staff from the city's Emergency Management Agency said no rescue teams had been sent yet, and residents had to take refuge on higher ground.

On the same day, a rail bridge in Shijiazhuang collapsed due to heavy rain. No casualties were reported.

Hundreds of villagers were stranded in a village in Baoding on Monday after the main road out of the village was cut off by flood waters, media reported.

According to the weather forecast, the heavy rainfall in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei will be significantly weakened from 8 am Tuesday to 8 am Wednesday. However, there will still be moderate to heavy rainfall in west-central and northern Hebei along the mountains, Beijing, northern Tianjin, and northern and western Henan. Some areas will experience short-term heavy precipitation.