CHINA : Rescuers Swim House to House in Floods

Chinese soldiers swam house to house through rising flood waters to rescue stranded residents as the death toll from some of the worst floods to hit southern China in half a century rose to nearly 200, officials said. Officials in flood-stricken areas banged gongs to alert sleeping villagers before rivers burst their banks, washing away thousands of houses and submerging huge areas of cropland, they said. “The scale of the disaster is still growing,” said an official in southwestern Guizhou province, where raging waters have killed an estimated 120 people since torrential rains began inundating the province Monday.