In Fuding, a city known for its tea plantations, firefighters waded through waist-deep floodwaters to rescue elderly residents, according to Reuters-verified footage.
In nearby Jinxi village, floodwaters inundated residential buildings and brought down a three-storey house, the footage showed.
Authorities have closed schools, suspended public transport and activated emergency flood measures across several coastal areas.
Saudel made its third landfall in Fujian on Thursday morning after strengthening again over the South China Sea.
The storm is the seventh typhoon to hit China this year and the third to strike Yuhuan in eastern Zhejiang in less than two months. The China Meteorological Administration has described the sequence as extremely rare, while experts have linked the pattern to El Niño conditions.
During El Niño years, a stronger Western Pacific subtropical high can steer typhoons along a northwestern path towards China’s eastern coast. The World Meteorological Organization warned on Thursday that El Niño could intensify further into 2027, potentially becoming the strongest on record and increasing the risk of prolonged extreme weather.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been relocated across Zhejiang and neighbouring provinces since late August, including more than 83,000 people evacuated in Fujian as Saudel moved inland.
In Putian, floodwaters spilled onto major highways, damaged bridges and inundated residential areas, according to videos shared on China’s RedNote platform.
State broadcaster CCTV reported on Friday that local authorities were deploying rescue teams to evacuate residents trapped by the floods. Some people have also been reported missing.
Stronger, longer typhoon season
Saudel follows Typhoon Narra, which brought heavy rainfall to Guangxi, Hainan and Guangdong provinces late last month.
The Ministry of Natural Resources warned that the continuing downpours could trigger secondary disasters, including landslides, as recent rainfall has already pushed rivers above warning levels and flooded low-lying areas.
Hui Su, a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, said Super El Niño conditions were shifting typhoon formation further east.
“This typhoon season, we tend to see stronger typhoons form towards the east and they travel long distances and they get much stronger when they actually reach land,” Su said.
He said the typhoon season could continue into December, later than the usual end in October or November, because of an extended period of warmer weather.
