Record-breaking temperatures and snow-blocked roads hampered evacuation efforts across northern China, where biting cold and blizzards have affected some 1.6 million people and damaged 100,000 homes, meteorological officials said Wednesday.

In China's western region of Xinjiang, blizzards over the weekend and a cold snap that was predicted to hit a record low of minus 45 degrees (minus 43 Celsius) on Wednesday killed five people, said Pan Jipeng, a spokesman for the Xinjiang Meteorological Station.

"We had advance knowledge so were prepared for the cold front, but it still remains a challenge to evacuate everyone since such cold weather and snow is rare for Xinjiang," Pan said.

He said 100,000 head of livestock had died and that the bad weather had flattened or damaged about 100,000 homes.

According to records from the Xinjiang Meteorological Station, the first 20 days of January brought more snow to Xinjiang than for the whole month in all previous years.

More than 150,000 people were evacuated from their homes in the region's Altay district, where it stopped snowing on Wednesday morning with about 3 feet (nearly 1 meter) of snow on the ground, five times more than the area receives in a normal year, Pan said.

Altay lies in China's extreme northwestern corner, 1,600 miles (2,600 kilometers) northwest of Beijing, the capital.

Freezing temperatures also hindered fishermen in Shandong province along the Bohai Sea, which experienced its worst ice coverage in 30 years along with coal shortages, according to a report posted on the State Oceanic Administration Web site.

Fishing and shipping services have been delayed since early January, the report said.

Temperatures in China's northern region of Inner Mongolia are expected to reach a low of minus 40 degrees (minus 40 Celsius) on Wednesday, according to a report from the National Meteorological Center Web site.

In neighboring Mongolia, an official this week appealed for help from the international community as his country battles the most severe winter it has seen in three decades.

A separate report posted on the Meteorological Center Web site said Tuesday that Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and other northern regions will experience high winds and sharp temperature drops in the next three days.

Parts of northern China are seeing their harshest winter in decades, with Beijing earlier this month receiving its heaviest one-day snowfall in 59 years. Temperatures in the capital were due to rise above freezing this week.