The CMA activated a level-three severe weather emergency plan requiring weather offices to guarantee 24-hour staffing, provide continuous updates on forecasts, alerts and disasters, and to warn and prepare the public.

The plan was initiated in units directly under the CMA and the Meteorological Bureau in Guizhou, Yunnan, Hunan, Hubei, Henan, Anhui and Shaanxi provinces.

The severe weather was expected to hit from January 25 to 28, said Xu Xiaofeng, deputy director of the CMA.

The CMA's weather warnings fall into four levels in accordance with their severity and status of emergency. Level three is "relatively severe".

"It is predicted this weather will severely affect transport, communications and energy supplies and people's work and lives," said a CMA statement.

At the same time, Hunan Provincial Meteorological Observatory in central China released red alert for ice on roads, reminding the public of the freezing road surface temperature.

The snow, the worst in a decade in many places, has hit most of the country since January 12, leaving homes collapsed, power blackouts, highways closed and crops destroyed.

Eight people have died in snow-related accidents, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs. About 32

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