Special Report: China's war on snow havoc

    GUIZHOU, March 6 (Xinhua) -- The month-long state of black-out emergency was canceled Wednesday night in Guizhou Province, one of the worst ice-stricken regions in south China.

    Sun Guoqiang, vice governor of Guizhou announced that the province's power network has basically resumed normal operation, thanks to the hard work by some 100,000 soldiers, policemen and electricians.

    The mass black-out struck the whole province in Jan. 29. The prolonged ice and snow disaster paralyzed 77 percent of the province's power transmission network and froze water pipelines.

    Water supply to 10.8 million rural residents and power supply to 9.5 million rural people had been disrupted in Guizhou for more than one month.

    The provincial water resources authorities said that by Wednesday, water supply to 3 million rural population had been resumed, and power has been back for 5.7 million people.

    "A complete recovery of the water supply system can be expected by the end of March," said Sun.

    As a power house for south China region, Guizhou has recovered14.38 million kilowatts of its total 20 million kilowatts maximum instant power transforming capacity by Wednesday, since the water resources-rich province resumed power output to the South China State Grid on Feb. 22.