After a year’s gap, the register in which the water position in the Siruvani Reservoir and water supplied to the city are noted on a daily basis in the city had an important entry. In the column where the water level is entered, a Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board employee wrote 878.51 m. The magic number in layman’s language means the Reservoir overflows.
The last time the register had a similar entry was exactly 12 months ago – August 1, 2013, said a TWAD Board source.
The storage level at 878.51 m means that the Reservoir has 49.57 feet water. The Reservoir’s dead storage level is 863.4 m.
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The source said that the Reservoir overflowed around 10 a.m. Friday, aided by heavy rains in the last two days in the catchment.
As of August 1, 8 a.m., the Dam had recorded 169 mm rain and the Adivaram 38 mm. On July 31, the Dam had recorded 120 mm and the Adivaram 30 mm. And, on July 30, the Dam had recorded 41 mm and the Adivaram 17 mm.
With the Reservoir overflowing, the TWAD Board had also increased the supply; on August 1 it supplied 98 million litres a day to the city.
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The Reservoir overflowing coincides with the Coimbatore Corporation’s decision to resume giving new water connections. It had stopped issuing new connections more than five months ago as the water level in the Siruvani Reservoir gradually came down.
In summer this year the Siruvani water position dropped so low that that Reservoir had only water that equalled 10 days supply to the city. This summer also saw the Kerala Government try and close a tunnel, which is below the dead storage level, on the grounds that it carried water to the city.
If Reservoir were to see overflow of water during the northeast monsoon season as well then the city would have comfortable position on the water supply front in the summer of 2015 as well.