Coimbatore woke up to cloudy skies on Monday morning and was greeted by showers around noon. Though the skies were overcast, the temperature dipped only marginally and that resulted in sultry weather.
Around 11 a.m., several parts of the city and its suburbs experienced showers. It rained for more than an hour in and around Town Hall, Singanallur, Race Course, Trichy Road, R.S. Puram and other areas. The sudden downpour resulted in water stagnation along roads and underpasses. This slowed down vehicular movement near the Lanka Corner junction, Kikani school underpass, Avinashi Road subway and Kaleeswara Mill.
Coimbatore City Traffic Police had to regulate and divert traffic to decongest the aforementioned areas.
Corporation sources said that the rain in the city could help ease the ground water supply to an extent as there was the possibility that the borewells could get recharged. Of the 2,146 borewells in the city, 214 had low yield and 144 had turned dry for the season. Officials said they hoped to get some relief on this front.
The drinking water supply situation would continue to remain the same as the rainfall in Siruvani catchments remained insignificant as of Monday.
Dengue prevention
Corporation’s health wing officials said that they would have to step up the work to destroy the mosquito larval breeding sites as the rain would result in water stagnation. As of Monday, the number of dengue-positive cases in the city stood at one and thus far (since March 1), the city had seen seven cases.
Officials in the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University’s Agro-climatic Research Centre said that the rain would continue for the next two to three days.
Monday’s rain was part of the summer showers that the district usually experienced during March, April and May.
The average rainfall during the period was 130 mm. Their prediction was that this year’s summer rain would be near the 130 mm mark.
Last year it was 68 mm.
Staff Reporter in
Ooty adds
Udhagamandalam and Coonoor Town received rain for the third consecutive day on Monday. A total of 48 mm rainfall was recorded on Sunday. The rain caused minor traffic delays, with the Commercial Road in Udhagamandalam witnessing bottlenecks. Due to the acute water crisis, many households made great use of the opportunity to stock up on rainwater by filling containers.
Forest areas, including the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve also received minor showers. Gudalur remained dry.
