Tag Archives: Cyclone Tauktae

Rescuers hunt 49 missing as cyclone pummels Indian coast

By Sumit Khanna and Aishwarya Nair

AHMEDABAD/MUMBAI (Reuters) -Naval vessels and aircraft scoured the waters off India’s west coast late on Wednesday after the most powerful cyclone in more than two decades battered the region, sinking an oilfield accommodation barge and killing 26 aboard, authorities said.

Cyclone Tauktae unleashed waves of up to 25 feet (7.6 metres) offshore before it hit the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat over the past two days, leaving a trail of destruction that killed 62 others, authorities said.

Naval ships and aircraft have been deployed to search for the 49 still missing from the barge tragedy.

“Search and rescue (SAR) operations off Mumbai and Gujarat entered their third day today. Indian Naval ships and aircraft are presently undertaking SAR of the missing crew members of accommodation barge P-305, which sank on May 17, 35 miles off Mumbai,” the navy spokesperson said in a statement.

The barge, with 261 people on board, sank after the storm smashed into the Bombay High oilfield near Mumbai, where India’s biggest offshore oil rigs are located.

The navy said 186 people had been rescued from the barge contracted to state-run energy explorer Oil and Natural Gas Corp.

“No one would have had survived if not for the help that came … We are thankful they saved our lives,” one survivor told Reuters TV partner ANI.

“I had never thought of witnessing a situation like this. I was thinking about my family more than my life. I got injured while jumping off the barge,” another worker rescued from the barge told ANI.

The barge was deployed by Afcons Infrastructure Limited, a construction and engineering company based in Mumbai.

“We will extend our fullest support including financial assistance to the bereaved families in this hour of their need,” Afcons said in a statement.

STRANDED

Several other ONGC vessels were stranded in the storm and the government has set up a committee to enquire into the sequence of events.

“The stranding, drifting and subsequent events have led to loss of several lives,” the government said in a statement.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi made an aerial survey of the damage in his home state of Gujarat, the state government said.

The federal government declared financial aid worth 10 billion rupees ($137 million) for immediate relief activities for Gujarat.

Relatives of those killed in the cyclone would also get financial assistance from the government.

Cyclone Tauktae has weakened since making landfall in Gujarat on Monday with gusts of up to 210 kph (130 mph) and is expected to lose strength overnight, weather officials said.

It ripped out power pylons, damaged about 16,500 homes and blocked more than 600 roads, piling pressure on authorities battling a massive spike in COVID-19 infections and deaths.

“Restoration work is extremely challenging due to rain and strong winds, but we are focusing on the efforts on a war footing,” Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani said.

Surveys to ascertain the farm losses and other damages would begin in full form tomorrow, he added.

Gujarat, among the states hardest hit by the second wave of the virus, will resume its vaccination effort from Thursday, after a three-day suspension because of the cyclone, a state health official, Jai Prakash Shivahare, told Reuters.

Wall collapses, electrocution incidents and falling trees were responsible for most of the state’s 46 cyclone deaths.

“We are yet to establish contact with many villages, and it is very likely the number of dead will rise,” an official said, requesting anonymity.

(Additional reporting by Nigam Prusty in New Delhi; Writing by Devjyot Ghoshal and Nupur Anand; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Himani Sarkar)

India’s Gujarat state evacuates over 200,000 people as cyclone hits

By Sumit Khanna

AHMEDABAD (Reuters) -More than 200,000 people were evacuated from their homes in the Indian state of Gujarat and authorities shut ports and major airports as the most powerful cyclone in more than two decades made landfall in the state late on Monday.

Rain intensified and several incidents of power outages were reported in the state. Electricity pylons and trees were uprooted and buildings were damaged in coastal areas of Gujarat, state authorities said.

With the worst of the storm expected to last for several hours after it slammed into the state’s coast, it piles more pressure on Indian authorities already struggling with a huge caseload of COVID-19 infections.

“This cyclone is a terrible double blow for millions of people in India whose families have been struck down by record COVID infections and deaths. Many families are barely staying afloat,” said Udaya Regmi, South Asia head of delegation, International Federation of Red Cross.

The cyclone has already killed at least 16 people and left a trail of destruction as it brushed past the coastal states of Kerala, Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra, the authorities said.

“The landfall process has started, and it is expected to last for four hours. The intensity of the Cyclone Tauktae will go down once it is over,” Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani said in a social media address on late Monday evening.

State revenue secretary Pankaj Kumar told Reuters it would be the most severe cyclone to hit Gujarat in at least 20 years. A 1998 cyclone killed at least 4,000 people and caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage in Gujarat.

Regmi said the Indian Red Cross Emergency team was working with authorities and helping with the evacuations from low lying areas to relief centers further inland in the face of what he called a “monster storm”.

PRAYING FOR LIONS

The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) categorized the storm, which formed in the Arabian Sea, as an “extremely severe” storm, upgrading it from “very severe”.

The cyclone brought gusts of up to 210 kph (130 mph) that would put it on par with a Category 3 hurricane, one level below the IMD’s super cyclone category.

Further down India’s western coast, the cyclone has lashed India’s financial hub of Mumbai, forcing authorities to suspend operations at the city’s airport and to close some main roads due to flooding. Tracks on Mumbai’s urban rail system, one of the world’s busiest, were also flooded.

Two barges with over 400 people on board were adrift near the Mumbai coastline and vessels were sent to provide help, said the local branch of India’s defense ministry.

As well as the 16 deaths reported in Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka, more than 25 fishing boats were missing, a coastguard official told Reuters.

The Gujarat Maritime Board, the state’s port regulator, directed hoisting of signals VIII to X, indicating great danger, at ports in the state. India’s largest private port at Mundra suspended operations for the day.

Authorities also fretted about the state’s Asiatic lions, an endangered species found only in the Saurashtra region of Gujarat where the cyclone is expected to inflict most damage.

“There are around 40 lions in some patches in coastal Saurashtra, and we are monitoring them. Some lions have already moved to higher grounds. We are keeping fingers crossed, and praying the lions will be safe,” Shyamal Tikadar, Principal Chief Conservator of Forests in Gujarat, told Reuters.

Rupani said all measures were being taken to deal with the situation.

“These are special circumstances. The administration is busy with the COVID-19 challenges, and is now gearing up to deal with the impact of the cyclone,” he added.

Gujarat and Mumbai both suspended their vaccination drives on Monday due to the cyclone.

(Reporting by Sumit Khanna in Ahmedabad, Rajendra Jadhav and Aishwarya Nair in Mumbai; Writing by Nupur Anand; Editing by Euan Rocha, Robert Birsel, Gareth Jones and Alison Williams)