Nagarjunasagar and Pulichintala, the joint multi-purpose projects of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, brimmed with water on Tuesday, a day after their gates were lifted, as heavy inflows continued from the upstream Srisailam project.
While all the 26 gates of Nagarjunasagar Project (NSP) remained open for the second day, flowing out more than 5.5 lakh cusecs on an average, 19 of the total 24 crest gates of the downstream Pulichintala project were opened on Tuesday.
Starting from 6 a.m. on Tuesday and all through the day, the NSP recorded water level of at least 570 feet against its full reservoir level of 590 feet. And holding about 2.5 lakh cusecs water in its reservoir the remaining water of about 6 lakh cusecs were let off into the downstream canals and the river course. Like NSP which started receiving record inflows on Monday, similar scenes were witnessed at the immediate Pulichintala Project in the downstream.
Full reservoir level
The water level at Pulichinatala was 150 ft against its full reservoir level of 175 feet, in the early hours, with a water capacity of 17.63 tmc ft out of its total capacity of 45.77 tmc ft.
Suryapet police, including its Superintendent R. Venkateswarlu, were busy visiting the flood-affected villages in the backwaters of NSP and along the Pulichintala, to alert and evacuate residents to safer places.
Chairman and MD of TSGenco D. Prabhakar Rao also visited the brimming Pulichintala dam site and its attached 120 MW hydro-electric scheme. After conducting a review with site officials, Mr. Rao, who spoke to reporters, said that all measures were being taken to generate optimum power from Srisailam and Nagarajunasagar projects.
“We are ready with grids for uninterrupted power for farmers and industries. All reviews are closely being monitored by the Chief Minister,” Mr. Rao said.
According to flood bulletins last available at 6 p.m., NSP was 15 feet short of the full 590-foot mark with 267 tmc ft water. Officials opened 18 gates at 15 feet and the remaining eight gates were opened 24 feet.
Water level in Pulichintala, with 19 gates opened to 12 feet, was at 157.95 feet and filled with 23.265 tmc ft water. For the record, 8,14,931 cusecs water was the inflows at NSP and 7,11,847 cusecs at Pulichintala. The outflows were 4.92 lakh cusecs and 4.24 lakh cusecs respectively.
