Poondi water floods low-lying areas

CHENNAI: The respite from rain in the last 24 hours brought down the inflow to Poondi reservoir, prompting the Water Resources Department (WRD) to reduce discharge to 23,000 cubic per second (cusecs) from 35,000 cusecs on Saturday. The discharge from Red Hills and Chembarambakkam lakes have also been brought down.

After the inflow went up to 42,000 cusecs on Friday due to intense rainfall and inflow from Ammapalli dam in Andhra Pradesh, the discharge from Poondi was stepped up to 35,000 cusecs. “As rainfall decreased, the lake is currently receiving 23,000 cusecs of water from Saturday morning. So the discharge was reduced to 23,000 cusecs,” said a senior WRD official.

The release flooded the low-lying areas near the lake, and the department issued notice to Collectors to evacuate people from more than 30 localities, including Manali, Manali New Town, Ennore, Sadayankuppam and Kosasthalaiyar coastal areas.

Meanwhile, the discharge from Red Hills and Chembarambakkam reservoirs has also been brought down. On Saturday, the release from Red Hills was reduced to 200 cusecs from 500 cusecs – the reservoir is receiving 1,250 cusecs. Similarly, after inflow into Chembarambakkam went down to 2,000 cusecs, so discharge was also reduced to 250 cusecs from 500cusecs.

“The inflow and outflow have come down because we didn’t receive rainfall for the past two days. The two lakes have enough storage now,” said the WRD official, adding that if the city receives intense rains again, they would release water accordingly.