People of this metropolis and neighbouring districts had prayers on their lips after the region was placed on Red Alert by the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) which forecast heavy to extremely heavy rainfall up to 20 cm on Wednesday night and Thursday.
Chennai and its neighbouring districts – Tiruvallur, Kanchipuram, and Chengalpattu – that heaved a sigh of relief on Tuesday with little or no rains – received incessant rains since Wednesday morning. The fresh rains added to the woes of Chennaiites many of whom are still reeling under floods owing to the record rains that hit the city on the night of November 6.
The city received 3 cm of rainfall in the last 12 hours ending at 5.30 pm on Wednesday, even as rains eased a bit in the fertile Cauvery Delta region which has been pounded by heavy rains since Tuesday afternoon.
The heavy rains had an impact on flight operations with eight flights being cancelled on Wednesday. Six more flights have been rescheduled or cancelled on Thursday.
In its latest update at 8 pm on Wednesday, the IMD said a “well-marked” low pressure in the Bay of Bengal developed into a Depression and is likely to cross the Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh coasts. Revenue Minister K K S S R Ramachandran said the depression is likely to cross between Mamallapuram and Sriharikota with Chennai and its neighbouring districts experiencing heavy to extremely heavy rainfall till Thursday.
Ramachandran said the state government was prepared to face the rains asserting that the administration has made “adequate arrangements.” Relief centres have been opened across the state, while the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) said it has kept 500 giant pumps to drain the rainwater and around 40 fibre boats to evacuate people in case of excessive waterlogging. 10 teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) have been fanned out across the state.
Nagapattinam district in the Delta region recorded the maximum rainfall for the last 24 hours ending at 8.30 am on Wednesday at 30 cm, while neighbouring Karaikal in Puducherry Union Territory too received a similar amount of rainfall.
The Cauvery Delta region experienced heavy rainfall inundating several thousand acres of crops with Nagapattinam and Karaikal in Puducherry Union Territory recording over 30 cm of rainfall each. Reports from Nagapattinam, Tiruvarur, Mayiladuthurai, and Thanjavur said agricultural fields are full of water, which is a cause of concern for lakhs of farmers who were hoping for a harvest before Pongal in January 2022.
In Chennai, Chief Minister M K Stalin was on the field for the fourth straight day visiting the shopping district of T. Nagar and nearby Mambalam, one of the worst-affected areas, despite crores of rupees being spent on constructing stormwater drains, and other beautification projects under the Smart City scheme.
Independent weather blogger K Srikanth said the satellite images indicate impressive banding of rains. “To all those who are wondering where the rains in Chennai are, the system has been consolidating slowly, bulk of rains are expected during the night. So, it will never be a question of whether Chennai Rains will happen but only a question of how heavy,” he said.
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