Thursday, March 28, 2024

Cyclone Tauktae: Police to probe why barge P-305 didn’t move away despite warning; Mumbai greenery sees massive destruction

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By PTI
MUMBAI: Mumbai Police will conduct a probe as to why the ill-fated barge P-305 which sank off Mumbai coast on Monday evening stayed in the area despite warnings about cyclone Tauktae, an official said.

Yellow Gate Police in south Mumbai on Wednesday registered an accidental death report (ADR) in connection with 22 persons on the barge whose bodies have been recovered.

The barge `Papaa-305′ or P-305 had 261 persons on board.

Of these, 186 persons were rescued while 53 are still missing.

Twenty-two were confirmed as dead.

This barge as well as two other barges that were hit by the cyclone were deployed by Afcons for a contract it had got from state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC).

The bodies of the workmen were brought to Mumbai by INS Kochi in the morning and 18 more were brought by INS Kolkata, the police official said.

Police are trying to ascertain why this accommodation barge — it had living quarters for employees working offshore — did not move away despite repeated warnings about the cyclone, he said, adding that statements of those rescued are being recorded.

“We will also seek the opinion of Director General, Shipping and other related agencies,” he said.

Cyclone leaves trail of destruction in Guj, death toll reaches 46

As many as 46 people were killed in the incidents related to cyclone Tauktae in Gujarat which made landfall on Monday night and left a trail of destruction before weakening and moving to Rajasthan, officials said on Wednesday.

Thousands of houses were damaged and trees and electricity poles were uprooted as Tauktae brought along heavy rains and high winds.

Of 46 deaths, 15 were reported from Amreli district in Saurashtra region, among the worst affected by the cyclone that crossed the state coast as an “extremely severe cyclonic storm” on Monday night.

Eight people each were killed in Bhavnagar and Gir Somnath districts, an official of the State Emergency Operation Centre (SEOC) said.

Five were killed in Ahmedabad, two each in Kheda and Panchmahal and one each in Anand, Vadodara, Surat, Valsad, Rajkot and Navsari districts, the official said.

A total of 24 persons were killed in wall collapse incidents, six died in tree falls, five died due to electrocution or house collapse.

One person died when a mobile tower crashed, the official said.

A total of 71 talukas (tehsils) in Gujarat were affected by the cyclone.

As many as 30,000 structures including 28,430 kachcha houses, 74,493 electricity poles and 674 roads were damaged, 68,753 trees uprooted and power supply snapped in over 9,000 villages.

The cyclone also killed 635 cattle, the SEOC said.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), the cyclone on Wednesday morning weakened into a “depression” and lay centred over east Rajasthan in the late afternoon.

It was positioned around 150 km west-southwest of Jaipur and was very likely to turn into a well-marked low pressure area, the IMD said.

In the next two days, “the remnant of the system” is very likely to move further north eastwards across Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, it said.

It will cause light to moderate rainfall in Uttarakhand and heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places in Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, west and east Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, north Madhya Pradesh and west Rajasthan in the next 24 hours, the met department added.

On Wednesday, a massive operation was undertaken to restore power supply to over 9,000 villages across Gujarat and clear roads, the government said.

By afternoon, power supply was restored in 5,489 out of 9,685 villages, it claimed.

A majority of these villages are located in coastal districts of Bhavnagar, Amreli, Jamnagar and Gir Somnath.

Rural areas of Anand, Kheda, Vadodara, Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar, Banaskantha, Navsari and Valsad were also affected.

Also, 989 roads were blocked due to fallen trees and electricity poles, of which 899 have been now cleared, officials said.

812 trees uprooted across Mumbai

As many as 812 trees were uprooted across Mumbai due to the impact of the extremely severe cyclonic storm Tauktae that brushed past the city coast, the civic body said on Wednesday.

According to a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) release, of the total trees uprooted by the strong winds triggered by the cyclonic storm, 70 per cent were of foreign origin.

These included tree species like sonmohar (peltoforum), gulmohar, thespesia, rain-tree and royal palm among others, it said.

The release said of the 812 trees which fell, 504 were on private premises and the remaining 308 on public places.

Also, 1,454 tree branches fell due to the storm.

Among these, 307 trees fell in Western suburbs, 256 in Eastern suburbs and 249 in the island city, the civic body said.

The cyclonic storm, which made a landfall on the Gujarat coast on Monday night, triggered strong wind, heavy rainfall and high tidal waves, and Mumbai reeled under its impact for three days (from May 16 to 18).

Under the influence of Tauktae, some places in Western suburbs received more than 300 mm rain, while the maximum wind speed of 114 mm was recorded in south Mumbai.

The civic body said its garden department worked round -the-clock to clear all the uprooted trees and fallen branches, which were affecting movement of vehicles.

However, the Mumbai BJP claimed that more than 48 hours after the storm brushed past the city coast, the civic body hasn’t removed the uprooted trees.

Claiming the BMC hasn’t yet appointed any contractor for tree pruning yet, though a proposal was tabled before the Tree Authority Committee in March 2021, Prabhakar Shinde, the BJP’s group leader in the civic body, threatened to move the Bombay High Court against the Shiv Sena-ruled corporation.

The BMC also assured regular tree audits besides planting new trees as per local conditions.

Last year, when the cyclone ‘Nisarga’ hit the Maharashtra coast, 323 trees fell in Mumbai between June 3 and 6.

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