Authorities in eastern India scrambled yesterday to move hundreds of thousands of villagers away from coasts expected to suffer widespread damage from a super cyclone, a task complicated by the battle on the coronavirus.
India faces one of its biggest storms in about a decade, the weather office said, as the super cyclone Amphan, equivalent to a hurricane of category 5, is expected to hit its east coast late today.
“We have just about six hours left to evacuate people from their homes and we also have to maintain social distancing norms,” a disaster management official, S G Rai, said.
“The cyclone could wash away thousands of huts and standing crops.”
Authorities in Odisha and West Bengal moved families to more than 1,000 shelters and hastily repurposing quarantine facilities soon after easing the world’s biggest lockdown against the virus, which has infected more than 100,000 and killed 3,163.
Amphan was yesterday still several hundred kilometres out to sea in the Bay of Bengal, packing winds of up to 235kmph and gusts of 255kmph.
Indian Meteorological Department director general Mrutyunjay Mohapatra said Amphan would be the most powerful weather system since a super cyclone in 1999 killed 10,000 people in Odisha.
West Bengal state official Manturam Pakhira said more than 200,000 people were being evacuated from coastal districts and the Sundarbans, a vast mangrove forest area.
“Authorities are also supplying masks and sanitisers and making arrangements so that they can maintain safe distance from each other,” he said.
In Odisha, relief commissioner Pradeep Kumar Jena said 20,000 people had been evacuated, with 600 disaster response teams standing by.
“We will evacuate more people depending on the situation. No one will be allowed to stay in huts with thatched roofs in coastal areas,” Jena said.
Rina Tripathi, disaster management advisor at the Red Cross, said thousands of social emergency response volunteers and national disaster response members were on the ground to sensitise and mobilise people to go to safer places.
“People from riverbanks, slums and other vulnerable areas are being sensitised and advised to move to shelters,” Tripathi said.
On the preparations, Syed Nasiruddin, general secretary of the West Bengal Red Cross Society, said, “We have over 200 trained volunteers in six districts. They, along with the local administration and the panchayats, have evacuated around 20,000 people from Digha till now.”
Amphan is expected to make the biggest impact in South and North 24 Parganas and East Medinipur districts of West Bengal.
On preparation done by Odisha, Tripathi said the state had 65 cyclone homes where evacuees were being shifted.
“The shelters are being equipped with tarpaulins, masks and first-aid kits,” she said.
“Odisha is quite used to it. The volunteers are advising people living near riverbeds or in high alert areas to shift. They are also teaching people about social distancing,” she said.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held a high-level administrative meeting to review the arrangements.
She has formed a task force, spearheaded by Chief Secretary Rajiva Sinha, which would review the situation and carry out rescue operations across the state.
“This cyclonic storm is going to be more disastrous than cyclone Aila. I urge all the people, especially those living in the coastal areas, to stay safe. They should not venture out in the open tomorrow after 12 noon. We have opened an emergency helpline at the state secretariat Nabanna to keep a close watch on the situation,” Banerjee told a press conference.
National Disaster Response Force director general S N Pradhan said: “This is the second disaster coming as we are already fighting Covvid-19. This requires continuous monitoring. We are calling it a cyclone in the times of Covid-19,” he added.
Pradhan said teams deployed on the ground have reliable wireless and satellite communications in case of communication blackout. “Based on experiences during cyclone Fani, all the teams are equipped with tree and pole cutters for post-landfall restoration,” he added.
The director general said as two states are facing the double whammy due to Covid-19 pandemic and cyclone, all the teams have been equipped with Personal Protection Equipment.
The weather condition is being continuously tracked by Doppler Weather Radar at Visakhapatnam district in Andhra Pradesh.
Men walk past as waves hit a breakwater at Kasimedu fishing harbour in Chennai yesterday, as Cyclone Amphan barrels towards India’s east coast.
