South China braces for first typhoon of year

BEIJING, April 17 (Reuters) - Southern China braced on Thursday for the first typhoon of the year, with almost 22,000 fishing boats called back to harbour, state media said.

Typhoon Neoguri was heading north for the island province of Hainan, skirting the coast of Vietnam, and was forecast to make landfall on Friday night or Saturday morning.

"Heavy rain and strong gales will hit Guangdong and Hainan with the approach of the typhoon," Xinhua news agency said.

Typhoons draw strength from the warm waters of the South China Sea and regularly target the Philippines, Japan, China, Taiwan and Hong Kong over the summer, sometimes with catastrophic effect. (Reporting by Nick Macfie; Editing by David Fogarty)

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