Authorities in eastern China are worried that the country's recent cold snap could cause potentially disastrous consequences for the region. Authorities fear ice drifts may lead to flooding along the Yellow River.

The length of frozen ice along the lower reaches of the Yellow River has reached a record high. Officials with the Yellow River Affairs Bureau say this could increase the possibility of ice jam flooding along the river. By the end of last week, the length of ice on the river stretched to about 100 miles long, about a mile longer than the previous record in 2005.

In some places, nearly 80 percent of the river surface has frozen, with the ice blocks covering areas as big as 900 square feet. That leaves little space for the remaining water to pass through, with fears that nearby areas could be flooded if the situation worsens.

The second longest river in China originates in the Bayan Har Mountains in Qinghai province in northwestern China. It flows 34-hundred miles through Ningxia and Inner Mongolia,autonomous regions and Gansu, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Henan and Shangdong provinces before running into the Bohai sea.