TN braces for cyclone, CM urges people to stay home
Precautionary measures taken in southern districts; total suspension of fishing operations for the next 3 days advised; rescue troops and disaster relief teams mobilised
Cyclonic Storm Burevi has formed in the Bay of Bengal, the Indian Metereological Department (IMD) confirmed on Wednesday aternoon. The depression that lay over southeast and adjoining southwest Bay of Bengal in the morning intensified into the cyclonic storm, the IMD said.
The storm, taking an unusual path, is expected to cross the coast of Sri Lanka and reach the Gulf of Mannar on Thursday evening or night.
Burevi is expected to cross the border between Kumari and Pamban on Friday.
Depressions that form in the Bay of Bengal normally turn into cyclones and make landfall in Tamil Nadu-andhra Pradesh coasts. However, Burevi has travelled from the Bay to Lanka and is to land in south Tamil Nadu through the Gulf of Mannar.
“The deep depression will cross the Sri Lanka coast today and move towards Kanyakumari area on Thursday morning. The path it is likely to take ater reaching the mainland will be tracked today,” they said.
At 8.30am on Wednesday, it lay over the same region about 500km east-southeast of
Trincomalee (Sri Lanka) and 900km east-southeast of Kanyakumari. The cyclone is expected to move on the Arabian Sea coast on to Oman.
“Heavy to very heavy rainfall is seen at a few places with isolated extremely heavy falls very likely over south Tamil Nadu (Kanyakumari, Tirunelveli, Thoothukudi, Tenkasi, Ramanathapuram and Sivagangai) on Dec.2 and 3; over south Kerala on Dec.3. Isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall likely over south Tamil Nadu on Dec.2 and 4 and south Kerala on Dec.3 and 4,” the IMD said.
The Met office has issued yellow alert for South Tamil Nadu and South Kerala coasts for Wednesday and Friday, and red alert for Thursday.
North Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Karaikal, North Kerala, Mahe, and South Coastal Andhra Pradesh are under yellow alert until Friday.
According to IMD sources, the southern districts of Kerala are likely to get extremely heavy rainfall, strong wind and would face rough sea conditions.
“Wind speed would gradually increase becoming 70-80kph, gusting to 90kph over southwest Bay of Bengal, along and off Sri Lanka coast from Wednesday morning for subsequent 24 hours.” Total suspension of fishing operation for the next three days is suggested. Fishermen have been advised not to venture into southeast Bay of Bengal, southwest Bay of Bengal and along and off east Sri Lanka coast till Thursday.
Officials at the state Secretariat said precautionary measures are being taken to deal with the storm in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu. Chief Minister Edappadi Palaniswamy has issued orders asking district administrations in Kanyakumari, Nellai and Thoothukudi to monitor precautionary measures.
Palaniswamy asked the public to refrain from going out as there is a possibility of a storm till Dec.4. He said rescue troops should camp at the affected areas with JCB vehicles, sawmills and sandbags, and ordered the authorities to keep an additional 1,000 personnel, power poles and transformers on standby.
Three disaster relief teams have been set up in Nellai district and two each in Madurai and Thoothukudi districts. Tamil Nadu health department, meanwhile, claimed that COVID-19 cases continued to remain low in the state. The state registered 1404 new Covid-19cases on Tuesday, taking the total number of persons tested positive for coronavirus infection in the state so far to 7,83,319.
Chennai registered 380 cases. With this, the total number of persons affected by the pandemic in the metropolis has reached 2,15,739.
Among neighbouring districts, Chengalpatu registered 86 new cases, Kancheepuram and Tiruvallur saw 63 infections each, with Tiruppur’s tally at 65.
The bulletin said 1,411 patients were discharged from various hospitals in Tamil Nadu. With this, the total number of recoveries in the State has touched 7,60,617.
Ten patients died on Tuesday.
As many as 10,980 persons are currently undergoing treatment in the state. Chennai has the most number of active cases at 3,702, followed by Coimbatore (935) and Chengalpatu (552).