China braces for New Year travel chaos amid fog
STORY: Some of Shanghai's best known landmarks disappeared behind a haze of fog on Friday (December 29).
Leaving Chinese year-end holidaymakers bracing for possible transport disruptions.
The weather bureau warned that the heavy fog would shroud areas from Hebei province in the north to Shanghai in the south for more than 24 hours.
The Central Meteorological Observatory issued its first red alert for fog since 2017.
Shanghai residents were unaccustomed to seeing their city like this.
"That's definitely different. In this hazy weather, I can no longer see the Shanghai Center Tower, which is the tallest building in Shanghai. As I look from the Puxi to Pudong side, the Oriental Pearl Tower is also faintly visible."
Some of the city's ferry routes were temporarily suspended. Some sections of highways and a bridge to a container port were temporarily closed.
Dense fog was predicted in parts of Hebei, Shandong, Anhui, Jiangsu and Shanghai leading to low visibility of less than 50 meters in some areas.
More than 600 flights were delayed in various cities, tracking app Flight Master showed.
The severe weather was due to high humidity and poor atmospheric diffusion conditions, forecasters said.
Conditions were expected to improve from Saturday evening, with a cold wave of air expected to blow over the country.
China has experienced a year of climate extremes.
Last week, most of the country was hit by a cold snap that rewrote records with sub-freezing temperatures.
In the summer scorching heat breached 125 degrees Fahrenheit in the northwest.
Summer storms also brought record rainfall to Beijing and flooding elsewhere.
