The Nandankanan Zoological Park, which had remained closed for two days after being ravaged by nor’wester winds on June 1, reopened on Sunday after restoration works.
Visitors queued up in large numbers to collect entry tickets to visit the zoo. A Nandankana senior official said, “This is the fourth time the zoo has been closed due to natural calamities in recent past. More than 100 trees were damaged or uprooted and power lines snapped because of gusty wind caused by the nor’wester on June 1.”
“As ticket bookings and checking are done through computers, entry of visitors was stopped due to the power failure. The restoration work took two days because of the severe damages to 33-KV lines. But damages to animal enclosures were minimal and, all the animals are safe in the zoo,” he added.
Besides, the computers and 33-KV lines, the CCTVs were also damaged in the thunderstorm. Officials had estimated the damages to be of Rs 50 lakh.