Evacuation of thousands of people living in low-lying areas in the four North Andhra districts began Saturday morning as the severe cyclonic storm Hudhud over west-central Bay of Bengal, moved further northwestward and lay centred about 300 km southeast of Visakhapatnam coast and about 380 km south-southeast of Goplapur.
HRD Minister Ganta Srinivasa Rao said that all steps were being taken to ensure zero casualty. Already evacuation has begun in Visakhapatnam district in nine coastal mandals. The district administration is likely to shift 35,000 people. Traffic has been stopped on the National Highway to ensure no transport vehicle is stuck in the storm region. In Srikakulam, the district administration hopes to evacuate 1 lakh persons on Saturday.
Hudhud is now within the range of Doppler Weather Radar in Visakhapatnam, and is being tracked minutely by the weathermen. “Apart from the DWR, we are also monitoring it using other satellite guided observational tools,” said Director of Cyclone Warning Centre Ramachandra Rao.
The director of CWC further added that there has been no major shift in the direction of Hudhud so far and as predicted it is likely to make landfall over north Andhra Pradesh coast around Visakhapatnam by the forenoon of Sunday.
He also informed The Hindu that Signal number 5 has been hoisted at ports in Visakhapatnam, Kalingapatnam, Machilipatnam, Kakinada and Bheemunipatnam and Krishnapatnam has been notified to hoist signal number 3.
We have informed the district collectors of Visakhapatnam, Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and East Godavari to suspend fishing and have alerted people in the coast and low lying areas, as the storm surge of about 1-2 meters above astronomical tide would inundate low lying areas of Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram and Srikakulam districts, said Mr. Ramachandra Rao.
Under its influence, there will be heavy to very heavy rainfall measuring between 6.5 cm to 24.4 cm over the three coastal districts in AP and over Ganjam, Gajapati, Koraput, Rayagada, Nabarangpur, Malkangiri, Kalahandi, Phulbani districts of south Odisha, in the next 48 hours.
Squally wind speed and gusting is likely to reach the speed of 150 km to 165 km during landfall over north AP and south Odisha.
The NDRF has already deployed its teams along the coast and the district administrations have started evacuation of people from low lying areas.
Railways have cancelled trains passing through or reaching Visakhapatnam on Sunday as a precautionary measure. Highway traffic is being controlled or diverted to ensure no vehicle is stranded on this section of the Highway when Hudhud makes a landfall. Navy and Army are on standby to provide humanitarian relief and rescue operations.
