A staggering 1,300 tmcft of floodwater has been discharged into the Bay of Bengal from Sir Aurthur Cotton (SAC) Barrage across River Godavari at Dowleswaram in East Godavari district so far in the season.
The floodwater flowed into the river mostly by early August as its tributaries received huge inflows owing to the incessant rains in Odisha, Chattisgarh and Telangana.
"At least 1,300 tmcft of floodwater in the Godavari has been released into the sea from the SAC Barrage, as the structure was only meant for diversion of floodwater and has a storage capacity of only three tmcft," according to the office of the Godavari River Flood Conservator.
Nearly 10% of the floodwater comes from Sabari, a tributary of the Godavari and has been let into the sea through the Godavari branches Vasista, Vynateya, Gowthami, Vridha Gowthami and Coringa.
If the multi-purpose Polavaram project becomes operational, at least 80 tmcft can be diverted to the Krishna river basin.
Barely 6,500 cusecs was released into the irrigation canals in the Godavari delta’s three canal systems, Eastern, Western and Central.
