It is not every day that you see one country hit by two cyclones in 24 hours. But how about two storms hitting two countries in 48 hours?

This is exactly what happened when Typhoon Nesat in the western Pacific and Tropical Storm Haitang in the South China Sea combined forces – and moved on similar paths towards Taiwan and then into China.

The first typhoon of the year made landfall on the northeastern coast of Taiwan on Saturday evening.

It crossed the island country in three hours and re-entered the Taiwan Strait as a weakened tropical storm, then made another landfall in Fujian Province of China where it rapidly weakened.

From the south, Tropical Storm Haitang made landfall on Sunday along the southerly coast of Taiwan. Then followed a similar path to Nesat, crossing the Strait and making landfall just to the north of its predecessor on Sunday.

Taiwan recorded some impressive rainfall totals of more than 1,000mm because of the two storms.

Flash flooding, mudslides, and widespread power outages were reported across much of the country.

The remnants of both storms have now combined and continue to bring rain to parts of southeastern China.