Rescue materials are ready to be loaded to aerotransport at an airport in Changzhi, north China's Shanxi Province, Feb. 1, 2008. A mass of rescue materials including overcoats and bedquilts had been transported to snow disaster area by air force transporters since Jan. 31.(Xinhua Photo/Yao Lin)

As of midnight Friday, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) of China had deployed 306,000 soldiers to combat the effects of the snow in the southern parts of the country, a military source said.

About 1.07 million militia and army reservists were participating in the weather relief effort, the PLA's emergency response group told Xinhua.

The PLA currently has 2.3 million troops.

More than 100 aircraft and helicopters remained on standby, air force sources said.

Two AN-26 transport planes flew to the southwestern province of Guizhou in the early hours of Saturday, carrying 5.5 tons of relief material and equipment including food, medicine and quilt.

Soldiers of Chinese People's Liberation Army load rescue materials on aerotransport at an airport in Changzhi, north China's Shanxi Province, Feb. 1, 2008. A mass of rescue materials including overcoats and bedquilts had been transported to snow disaster area by air force transporters since Jan. 31. (Xinhua Photo/Yao Lin)

Military vehicles such as field kitchen trucks and armored cars played an important role in de-icing and rescue missions.

In the southern city of Guangzhou, about 1,500 soldiers helped maintain order in its train station.

Soldiers of the Hubei Military Area in central China helped local police to restore a 28-km section of the Beijing-Zhuhai Expressway, the country's key north-south trunk road, which had been closed by dangerous icing. Those efforts helped more than 6,000 vehicles and 12,000 stranded riders continue their journeys.

The snow, the heaviest in decades in many places, has been falling in China's eastern, central and southern regions for more than a fortnight. It has caused deaths, structural collapses, blackouts, accidents, transport problems and livestock and crop destruction.

Winter clothes and other disaster-relief stuff are boarded onto a jet plane of the Chinese air forces in Xianyang, Shaanxi Province, before they are transported to snowstorm-affected regions in Southwest China's Guizhou Province, Jan. 31, 2008.(Xinhua Photo)

Editor: Yan