Thousands stranded as storms hit China quake area

A man pushes his tricycle down a flooded street in Mianyang, Zitong County, Sichuan province September 24, 2008.

BEIJING (Reuters) - Continuous rain near the epicenter of China's May 12 earthquake has killed at least eight people and left 38 missing, with thousands stranded by mountain torrents, cave-ins and mudslides, state media said on Wednesday.

The downpours began to pound Mianyang city and surrounding countryside in Sichuan province, southwest China, on Monday night, Xinhua news agency said.

Mianyang encompasses Beichua and other areas that were the hardest-hit counties in the Sichuan earthquake, which killed at least 80,000 people.

In the latest disaster, at least 2,200 houses have collapsed and 6,500 people were stranded throughout the hilly region, Xinhua said. "Some pre-fabricated houses built after the quake and other residences were flooded," the report said.

More than 300 people were injured in the downpours, said an earlier report.

The rainstorms were separate to a typhoon which plowed into a densely populated area of south China on Wednesday, triggering a "once-in-a-century storm tide" in several cities.

Earlier this month, a mudslide caused by the collapse of a mine waste reservoir killed more than 260 people in their village homes in northern China.

(Reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie and Paul Tait)