Biswabrata Goswami
MIDNAPORE, 25 MAY: As many as 90,000 people have been evacuated in coastal blocks of East Midnapore as cyclone Yaas gathered pace. The mass evacuation process began on 24 May from low-lying areas of coastal villages and they have been taken to nearby cyclone shelters while maintaining all Covid protocols, said Aditya Vikram Jinnai, SDO (Contai).
Severe Cyclonic Storm ‘Yaas’ is likely to intensify further into a Very Severe Cyclonic Storm during the next 12 hours, a bulletin of the Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC) Kolkata said on Tuesday.
The cyclonic storm that lay centered over east central & adjoining west central Bay of Bengal moved northwestwards with a speed of about 17 kmph in the past six hours. At about 0830 hours, it was located about 280 km south-southeast of Paradip (Odisha), 380 km south-southeast of Balasore (Odisha), 370 km south-southeast of Digha (West Bengal) and 370 km south-southwest of Sagar Islands (West Bengal).
“It is very likely to cross north Odisha-West Bengal coasts between Paradip and Sagar Island close to north of Dhamra and south of Balasore, during the noon of Wednesday, the 26th May as a Very Severe Cyclonic Storm,” G.K. Das, deputy director and head of the RMC said.
The India Meteorological Department has issued a “Red Warning ” of extremely heavy rainfall at isolated places over West Bengal’s East & West Midnapore districts on Wednesday when the cyclone makes landfall. Squally wind would gradually increase to “90-100 Kmph gusting to 110 kmph from 26th early hours and increase thereafter becoming 90-120 kmph gusting to 145 kmph over northwest Bay of Bengal along & off East Medinipur districts at the time of landfall”.
To monitor the situation, the district administrative officials have been camping at Digha since last night and they have deployed disaster management teams along with Police, PWD, Fire, Forest and WBSEDCL employees at strategic locations at each block in the district.
Local residents are panicked as the cyclone would coincide with the full moon tide and the water level in the seas and river may rise further, leading to breach of embankments. At several places in the coastal areas, along with the administration, people have tried to strengthen the embankments.
Seawater entered human habitation through the breaches on the two-kilometer saline embankment between Sankarpur and Tajpur today, threatening as many as 15 villages under Ramnagar-I block. The sea surge has progressed up to 300 metres from the shore, entering the paddy fields and residential areas. Villagers of Tajpur, Jaldha, Chandpur, Jamrah, Shankarpur, Lachimpur under Talgachi-II GP are living in fear as tidal waves constantly hit the beach since last night.
