Typhoon Saola slams southern China after battering Hong Kong

Typhoon Saola roared ashore in southern China early on Saturday (Sep 2) as a weakened but still dangerous threat that has lashed Hong Kong and forced millions to hunker down for one of the region's strongest storms in decades.

Typhoon Saola roared ashore in southern China early on Saturday (Sep 2) as a weakened but still dangerous threat that has lashed Hong Kong and forced millions to hunker down for one of the region's strongest storms in decades.

Tens of millions of people across Hong Kong, Shenzhen and other southern Chinese megacities had braced for the menace of a cyclone rated as a super typhoon.

And while it delivered a fierce but glancing blow to the special administrative region, Saola - now downgraded to a severe typhoon - landed south of Hong Kong with its toughest blows.

China's National Meteorological Center said Saola made landfall at around 3.30am on Saturday (4.30am, Singapore time) to the south of the city of Zhuhai in Guangdong province, south of casino hub Macau.

More than 880,000 people were evacuated across two Chinese provinces ahead of Saola making landfall, hundreds of flights were cancelled across the region, and trees were uprooted around the rain-battered streets of Hong Kong.