“The safety of residents and students is the most important point to consider,” Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying said at a press conference on Tuesday morning.
Leung was responding to criticism from parents regarding the timing of the Tuesday’s red rain warning, which was raised by the Observatory at 7:35am . The Education Bureau then announced at 7:49am that classes would be cancelled. However, many children in the city had already started making their way to school.
Leung said that he believed that the Observatory was objectively evaluating the weather and that it was using scientific methods to judge weather conditions.
The Observatory issued the yellow rainstorm signal at 6am this morning, only to change it to the red rainstorm signal at 7:35am.
It subsequently changed the signal to yellow, then red, and then yellow again.
The last red rainstorm signal was cancelled at 13:45 and replaced with a yellow rainstorm signal.
The yellow signal was then cancelled 14:45pm.
“A fresh easterly airstream will affect the south China coast in the latter part of this week,” the Observatory predicts. “Another trough of low pressure is expected to bring thundery showers to the coast of Guangdong early next week.”
HKFP has contacted the Education Bureau for comment.
