Tense rescue op in Arabian Sea
It has weakened into a ‘cyclonic storm’ and will gradually become a ‘deep depression’
AT LEAST 27 DEAD
At least 27 people were killed and over hundred were missing after the extremely severe cyclonic storm Cyclone Tauktae battered India’s western coast on Monday, making landfall in Gujarat after leaving a trail of destruction in Kerala, Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra.
317 PEOPLE RESCUED, NEARLY 400 STRANDED
The Indian Navy and Coast Guard rescued 317 people on board two barges that went adrift near Mumbai, but 390 more remain stranded or missing from offshore facilities, an official said on Tuesday. Three barges and an oil rig with 707 personnel on board went adrift on Monday. Images circulated by the Navy showed destroyer INS Kolkata picking up two survivors overnight from the barge P305. The Navy on Tuesday said the barge has sunk. Dramatic TV visuals also showed personnel on board what looked like a sinking rig being rescued. There was no confirmation from Navy officials on the vessel’s identity.
ANOTHER STORM
Another cyclone could be brewing with a low-pressure area likely to form over the east-central Bay of Bengal around May 23 that might intensify further into a depression and a cyclone, IMD said.
NEW DELHI: At least two dozen people were dead and more than 100 missing on Tuesday after Cyclone Tauktae battered India’s west coast and made landfall the previous night in Gujarat, where damage was reported in about 2,500 villages across the southern region of the state, leading to disruption in power and internet connectivity.
In Maharashtra, 16 people were reported dead in four coastal districts. Close to a hundred roads were blocked, with thousands of tree being uprooted by gusty winds of up to 170km per hour, officials said. Maharashtra relocated close to 100,000 people to safety, they said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Gujarat and Diu on Wednesday to review the situation there and the damage by the cyclone, according to people aware of the developments.
Tauktae crossed the Gujarat coast as an “extremely severe cyclonic storm” around midnight and gradually weakened into a “severe cyclonic storm”, before further weakening to a “cyclonic storm”, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Tuesday.
Seven fresh deaths took India’s toll to at least 27, including a child crushed by a collapsreceived ing wall, an 80-year-old woman killed by a falling pole and a teenage girl by a crumbling roof.
The cyclone, with wind speeds of up to 165 kmph, made landfall near Porbandar in Gujarat, causing widespread rainfall across Gujarat and southern parts of Rajasthan on Tuesday. The impact of the cyclone is expected to be seen in northern India on Wednesday, with IMD predicting widespread rainfall in north India and issuing orange alert for the region.
The Indian Coast Guard on Tuesday said it rescued eight fishermen onboard a fishing boat that drifted into the sea off the coast of Veraval harbour in Gujarat due to the cyclone. Two Coast Guard Chetak helicopters, operating from an airbase in the Union Territory of Daman, rescued eight crew members of stranded ship Gal Constructor from the sea off the Satpati coast (in neighbouring Maharashtra) amid very rough and inclement weather conditions, a statement said.
Battling extreme weather, the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard have so far rescued 314 people on board two barges that went adrift in the Arabian Sea near Mumbai hours before Cyclone Tauktae made landfall on the Gujarat coast, an official said on Tuesday.
Three barges and an oil rig with 707 personnel on board had gone adrift on Monday. These included accommodation barge P305 with 273 persons, cargo barge GAL Constructor with 137 personnel on board, accommodation barge SS-3 with 196 personnel on board and the Sagar Bhushan oil rig with 101 personnel on board, a navy official said. While all the 137 people on board the cargo barge GAL Constructor have been rescued, 180 of the 273 onboard P305 have been rescued so far, the official said.
In Maharashtra, district authorities in coastal areas reported 16 deaths and horticulture damage to 9,000 hectares of land. Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray urged Union home minister Amit Shah on Tuesday for financial assistance from the central government from National Disaster Relief Fund.
Cyclone Tauktae impacted in 10 Maharashtra districts even though Ratnagiri, Raigad and Sindhudurg were worst hit. Around 30% of the villages in Raigad and Ratnagiri were still in the dark because of the electricity outage, an official said.
According to the report by the state government, 3,571 villages and 215,266 people were affected in the coastal districts. The report said 17,657 structures were partially or fully damaged.
“Mango growers in Sindhudurg and Ratnagiri have sustained huge losses… The crop has been completely destroyed,” said Sanjay Yadavrao of Konkan Bhoomi Pratisthan, a social group working for peasant rights.
Many areas of Ahmedabad city were inundated with kneedeep water following incessant downpour since the afternoon as the cyclone passed northward along the district’s periphery. The city received a staggering 75.69mm of rain between 6am and 4pm, said municipal commissioner Mukesh Kumar.
Traffic on several roads was hindered due to fallen trees and hoardings. Heavy rain also hit southern parts of Rajasthan late on Tuesday. The weather department has announced red alert in over half a dozen districts where heavy to very heavy rainfall is expected on Wednesday. “The cyclone will be entering Rajasthan by late Tuesday night. At present the system is in Gujarat. It will enter state as depression and will weaken by May 20,” said climate scientist Radhey Shyam.