Flooding in China forced passengers to wait for help on the roof of a bus after it had fallen into a river, leaving at least three people dead.

People were seen on top of the almost submerged bus in a fast-flowing river outside the city of Shijiazhuang, which is about 165 miles (265km) southwest of Beijing.

The authorities in the northern Hebei province said that 37 of the 51 people on the bus had been rescued.

State broadcaster CCTV reported that three people had died with another 11 still missing.

It comes as more than 120,000 people were evacuated as thousands of homes collapsed in the neighbouring Shanxi province.

The amount of heavy rainfall was nearly four times the monthly average in Shanxi and had displaced more than 1.76 million people, local media reported.

The region is normally dry, but the Xinhua News Agency said the rainfall had damaged crops across 190,000 hectares (470,000 acres), which represents an area bigger than the size of London.

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A section of a wall in the historic town of Pingyao, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has also been damaged amid ongoing fears over a number of ancient monuments.

Operations have been suspended at 60 coal mines in Shanxi, which is a major coal-producing area and comes as the government continues to address power shortages which has had an impact on industry.

Last week, a landslide killed four traffic police officers in the province, according to the state-run Global Times.

Large areas were left flooded by water, trapping residents and causing some bridges to be washed away.

The torrential rain fell for several days – but more details about the number of casualties have not yet been released by the authorities.

In July and August, more than 300 people died after flooding hit central China, including 14 who were killed after getting trapped in a flooded subway line.

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