Rain lashed city as Cyclone ‘Dana’ inched closer to coast
Kolkata: Several districts of Bengal received moderate to heavy rain on Thursday, as severe cyclonic storm ‘Dana’ inched closer to the state’s coast and that of neighbouring Odisha.
By 9:30 pm on Thursday, the roads in Kolkata wore a deserted look. After Covid pandemic, this was the first time that almost no vehicles and people were seen on the roads.
The cyclonic storm ‘Dana’ is set to make landfall between Bhitarkanika National Park and Dhamra Port in Odisha early Friday morning but the process began late Thursday evening. With the cyclone approaching the Odisha coast rapidly on Thursday evening, both Bengal and Odisha braced for its impact. According to IMD, wind speeds during landfall are expected to reach 120 km/h, and heavy rainfall and storm surges will accompany the cyclone. Satellite images have captured its approach and intensity as it barrels toward Odisha coast. The IMD issued red, yellow and orange alerts for several districts of Bengal. Red alert has been issued for East Midnapore, West Midnapore, South 24-Parganas which will receive heavy to very heavy rainfall (07- 20cm) at a few places with ‘extremely heavy’ rain (>20 cm) at one or two places. An orange alert has been issued for Kolkata, Howrah, Hooghly, North 24-Parganas and Jhargram districts where there will be heavy to very heavy rainfall (07-20cm). Yellow alert of heavy rainfall (07-11cm) has been issued for the rest districts of South Bengal. The Bengal government established a safe zone for fishing trawlers at Mohona in Digha, Purba Medinipur, ahead of the expected cyclone ‘Dana’. Evacuation efforts from danger zones were carried out by several agencies of the state government.
More than 150 express and passenger trains have been cancelled by the South Eastern Railway division. The trains cancelled include Howrah-Secunderabad Falaknuma Express, Kamakhya-Yesvantpur AC Express, Howrah-Puri Shatabdi Express.The East Coast Railways also cancelled as many as 198 trains including Howrah-Secunderabad, Shalimar Puri, Kamakhya-Bangalore, New Delhi-Bhubaneswar etc. EMU local train service from Sealdah station and Hasnabad remained suspended from 8 pm on Thursday to Friday morning. The Eastern Railways also cancelled several express trains including Patna-Ernakulam Express, Kolkata-Puri, Puri-Kolkata, Dibrugarh-Kanyakumari, Bengaluru-Guwahati among others. Shantanu Thakur, Union Minister of State, Ports, Shipping & Waterways, conducted a review meeting with Kolkata Port stakeholders on Thursday in the wake of Cyclone Dana. Key measures taken by Kolkata Port include activating control rooms at both Kolkata Dock System (KDS) and Haldia Dock Complex (HDC).
These are being manned by port officials to monitor the situation closely. All vessels were safely taken inside docks or securely moored at anchorages or jetties.
