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China’s Spring Festival Travel Season Faces a Major Cold Wave

BBC Chinese recently reported that China has entered its annual 40-day travel peak season (15 days before and 25 days after the Spring Festival which is February 8 this year). According to the Ministry of Transportation, during this season, the total travel volume will reach 2.91 billion person-trips, which represents an increase of 3.6 percent over last year. However, this year’s season may face a serious challenge from the expected major cold wave which has already brought record low temperatures to various regions in China. Many regional electricity companies and railway administrations have started to prepare for severe icy conditions and snow storms. The 2008 Spring Festival travel season suffered a similar cold wave which caused massive damage, impacting over one hundred million travelers. The scale of this year’s volume is expected to be even higher. In fact, some highways in Chongqing and Guangdong have already closed due to snow.

Source: BBC Chinese, January 24, 2016
http://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/simp/china/2016/01/160124_china_chunyun_begins