Mumbai faces strong Cyclone

– Mumbai authorities ordered offices and factories to shut and people to stay home yesterday, reversing a move to ease a coronavirus lockdown as the Indian megacity faced its first cyclone in more than 70 years.

Cyclone Nisarga was expected to make landfall near the coastal town of Alibag, around 100km south of Mumbai, yesterday afternoon, forecasters said.

Maharashtra state, of which Mumbai is the capital, and neighbouring Gujarat have evacuated at least 100 000 people to safer locations and ordered fishermen not to go out until the storm passes.

The evacuees include nearly 150 coronavirus patients from a recently built field hospital in Mumbai, underscoring the difficulties facing the city ahead of the monsoon season as it struggles to contain the pandemic, with around a fifth of India’s cases.

Mumbai police announced fresh restrictions on the city of 18 million people, which was just beginning to emerge from a monthslong lockdown, and banned gatherings of four people or more until today.

“Refrain from venturing out to coast-beaches, promenade, parks and other similar places along the coastline,” the police tweeted early yesterday.

Slum-dwellers in low-lying areas of Mumbai have been instructed to move to higher ground, Thackeray said earlier on Tuesday, with city authorities turning empty schools into temporary shelters.

Indian meteorologists have warned of heavy rainfall – with winds of 100-110km/h and gusts of up to 120km/h – causing damage to thatched huts, power lines and one to two metre-high storm surges inundating low-lying areas of Maharashtra.