A tornado and hail storms have killed at least 51 people in Xinhua, China.

The storms brought down power lines and houses in the Jiangsu province according to Xinhua news agency,

“Downpours, hail storms and a tornado battered parts of Yancheng city … causing many houses to topple.”

Yancheng city was hit by the storms around 2:30 pm (0630 GMT) on Thursday.

Winds of up to 125 km (77 miles) per hour struck the city and outlying suburbs, destroying numerous houses, according to the report.

Pictures posted by the media agency showed injured people amid overturned houses and cars, split tree trunks, broken power lines, according to Reuters.

On Monday, heavy floods killed 22 people and displaced 197,000 in central China. Economic losses incurred directly from the floods were nearly 2.7 billion yuan ($410 million) according to state media.

China’s vice premier Wang Yang said that China had faced these volatile weather conditions as a result of the influence of El Nino.