(File photo: IC)

BEIJING, Aug. 27 (Xinhua) -- China's national observatory renewed a red alert, the highest warning level, for Typhoon Bavi at 6 a.m. Thursday, which is expected to bring gales and rainstorms to northeast China.

The typhoon, the eighth of this year, is expected to move northward at a speed of 40 km to 50 km per hour before making landfall in coastal areas between Donggang City of Liaoning Province and North Pyongan province in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Thursday morning, the National Meteorological Center (NMC) said.

The typhoon was observed at waters about 195 km south of the border of China and DPRK at 5 a.m., with a maximum wind force of 136.8 km per hour near its eye, the NMC said.

From Thursday morning to Friday morning, gales are expected to hit the Bohai Strait, parts of the Yellow Sea, provinces of Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning as well as coastal areas off the Shandong Peninsula, according to the NMC.

During the same period, some regions in Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning and Inner Mongolia will experience downpours, with some areas seeing up to 150 mm of rainfall, the NMC said.

The center advises people and vessels in disaster-prone areas to take shelter from winds.

China has a four-tier color-coded weather warning system, with red representing the most severe weather, followed by orange, yellow and blue.