Flights, trains cancelled
With cyclone Hudhud hurtling towards the Odisha coast with an expected wind speed of about 120 kmph in the State’s southern part, the State Government on Saturday began evacuating people from vulnerable areas to minimise casualties even as two flights and 39 trains were cancelled.
“The Collectors of eight districts - Koraput, Malkangiri, Nabarangpur, Rayagada, Gajapati, Ganjam, Kalahandi and Kandhamal are on the job to shift people from vulnerable areas to safe places,” Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) PK Mohapatra said.
By Saturday evening, a total of 7,369 people were evacuated to safer places in the vulnerable areas, including the Bonda hills in Malkangiri district, he said.
Meanwhile, rains have been reported from some areas, mostly in the southern region, but there was no report of any major damage so far, sources in the SRC said.
Malkangiri, which is likely to be the worst-hit, is experiencing heavy rainfall and strong winds have been reported from it. One ‘kuchha’ house at Gudguta village was damaged as a tree fell on it but there was no report of any casualty from anywhere in the district, the sources informed.
Mohapatra said about 3.5 lakh people, including those living in the coast of Ganjam, were being evacuated and the district authorities had been asked to start a free kitchen. They had also been asked to stock adequate quantities of dry food, he told.
The Government has deployed 25 units - 15 of NDRF and 10 of ODRF, each comprising 40 personnel, besides fire service men in vulnerable places in different parts of the State for rescue and relief operations, the SRC said.
Supplementing the SRC, Chief Secretary GC Pati said since the southern part of the State was likely to be more affected by the cyclonic storm, heavy rainfall and consequent floods, Collectors of eight districts falling over the southern region had been asked to carefully assess and evacuate all vulnerable population to safe buildings.
He maintained that cyclone and floods being new to the tribal population in these districts, their respective administrations were facing difficulty in convincing the people to shift.
“We have engaged public announcement system and local community leaders to ensure that all the people living in kutcha houses are taken to safe places,” Pati said.
The Malkangiri Collector had been asked to ensure that none remained inside kutcha houses. The administration was told to evacuate all the people living in such houses to safe places positively in keeping with the State’s target of ‘zero casualty’ in the coming cyclone.
Further, though the State Government expects the maximum wind speed in areas adjoining Andhra to be within 100 km per hour, it apprehended that heavy rainfall could create problems for the people as well for the rescue teams.
“The rainfall could be in the range of 10 cm to 25 cm within a span of only 36 hours from Sunday afternoon,” said the SRC.
He said besides the eight identified districts, many other places would also receive rainfall from Sunday afternoon to Monday afternoon as per the IMD prediction. Preparations were ready to deal with possible flood in rivers like Rushikulya, Bamsadhara and Nagavali, he asserted.
The Chief Secretary said the Centre had assured the State Government to keep some choppers ready at the Kalaikunda airbase in West Bengal for air dropping of food packets in the affected areas.
The State has received 14 satellite phones and the Centre has also sent eight more NDRF teams as per its request, he said.
According to the latest bulletin of IMD here, the very severe cyclonic storm was lying within the range of Doppler weather radar, Visakhapatnam. It was also being tracked by satellite and other observational tools.