BEIJING, July 9 (Xinhua) -- Torrential rain has battered south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, prompting the deployment of drones and pilots to support rescue operations.
With ground access severed, the first priority was to restore communications. At 5:30 a.m. Tuesday, two Wing Loong drones, dispatched by the Ministry of Emergency Management, took off from central China's Hubei Province. After a three-hour flight, they began orbiting over the worst-hit areas in Guangxi, functioning as airborne base stations. They restored mobile coverage and provided services more than 8,000 times.
Next came supply deliveries. "Some places take a rescue boat two to three hours for a round trip, but a cargo drone can reach them in three to four minutes, carrying about 100 kg of supplies," said Xiao Qin, an employee of a drone company working at the scene.
China Anneng Construction Group, a state-owned engineering rescue force, said its heavy-lift drones airdropped more than 120 packages of relief goods to isolated villages.
Ramunion, a civilian rescue team based in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, said its drones flew 35 sorties in four hours on Wednesday, delivering 4 tonnes of food, water and medicine to three marooned villages.
Logistics firm SF Express sent two rescue drones to Hengzhou. They relayed live aerial footage of the flood zone to rescue crews while dropping supplies, boosting rescue efficiency.
In some cases, drones carried out rescues themselves. On Monday, a truck driver trapped by floodwater was lifted to safety by a heavy-lift drone in Guangxi, as shown in widely circulated media footage.
On Tuesday, more than 300 volunteer pilots gathered in Hengzhou with agricultural drones, delivering supplies free of charge, according to volunteers on site.
Despite their extensive reach, drones remain a supplement to broader ground efforts. More than 8,300 rescuers, backed by over 1,700 vehicles and 5,700 boats, are reinforcing reservoirs, searching for the missing, and pumping out floodwater in an orderly manner, according to local authorities. ■
