The water levels in all the dams in the State were being monitored round-the-clock and the reservoir operations in the State were being managed by the Irrigation Department, Kerala State Electricity Board Limited, and the Kerala State Disaster Management Authority (KSDMA) considering forecast of the Indian Meteorological Department, the State submitted before the Kerala High Court.
The State submitted an affidavit in a suo motu case initiated by the Kerala High Court.
For ensuring the timely and accurate monitoring of reservoirs, nodal officers were appointed to monitor each dam under the Irrigation Department.
With heavy rainfall along with huge inflows observed in dams under Irrigation Department, control room functioned 24X7 with necessary officials to coordinate with operations, it submitted.
Satellite phones were provided to the nodal officers to ensure seamless connectivity. Necessary warnings were given from the reservoir offices to departments concerned regarding the opening of shutters.
Steps for monitoring the water levels in canals and river and to clear the obstruction were also taken. Protective measures were ensured to prevent canal breaches, it submitted.
The authority submitted that the Mullaperiyar reservoir, operated by Tamil Nadu, had a catchment area of 624sq.km and effective storage capacity of 7.666 TMC. The dam was exceptionally vulnerable because of its large catchment area and limited storage capacity, it submitted.
Safety engineers were monitoring the dams of the board with round-the-clock vigilance. They were all provided with satellite phones in locations where mobile range was feeble and sporadic to communicate with the control rooms in case of failure of normal channel of communication. Control rooms were working round-the-clock at all major dam sites as well as at Dam Safety Organisation Headquarters at Pallom, Kottayam, it submitted.
Till August 15, all the reservoirs of the board together had a storage of 2243.26 MCM, which was 63.50% of its total storage capacity. The Irrigation Department had 16 dams and four barrages with a gross storage capacity of 1,570 MCM. Till August 13, the storage of 16 dams was only 971.39 MCM, which was 61.8% of total capacity, it submitted.
