Cyclone Biparjoy, (pronounced ‘Biporjoy’, which means “disaster” in Bengali) left a trail of destruction in the Kutch and Saurashtra regions of Gujarat, as it moved towards Rajasthan on Friday. The cyclone moved northeastwards after landfall along the Saurashtra-Kutch coasts near Jakhau and weakened into a cyclonic storm, and is expected to become a deep depression over south Rajasthan around midnight today.
However, in its trail, Biparjoy left over 1,000 villages without power with hundreds of electric poles getting damaged, while several coastal villages were flooded by the incoming seawater and heavy rains that followed.
As per the latest reports, the eye of the cyclone near Gujarat’s Dholavira with a windspeed still at 80-90 kmph.
Cyclone Biparjoy Top 10 Points:
▶The cyclone is weakening and moving over Rajasthan’s Barmer, Jalore, Jaisalmer, Sirohi, Jodhpur, Pali, and nearby places, where the India Meteorological Department has sounded an ‘Orange alert’ predicting heavy to very heavy rainfall till Saturday.
▶The cyclonic storm damaged thousands of electricity poles, rendering 4,600 villages without power in Gujarat, even as authorities maintained that there was no loss of human life due to Biparjoy. Electricity supply was restored in 3,580 villages, while more than 1,000 are reportedly still without power.
▶Amid the tense moments, authorities evacuated over a lakh people from coastal areas of Gujarat as a precautionary measure. Despite the strong winds and heavy rains, a total of 709 pregnant women were successfully rescued and transported to hospitals. Two babies were even delivered inside the state government’s ‘108’ ambulances.
▶The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) reported two casualties preceding the cyclone’s arrival. A father-son cattle-rearing duo died while attempting to save their trapped goats from a flooded ravine in Bhavnagar district the same day. One woman was also killed in a separate incident when a wall collapsed in Dhaniyavi village in Vadodara taluk due to strong winds.
▶As cyclone Biparjoy “landed” in Gujarat, the Western Railway (WR) trains schedules were hit with cancellations or partial operations of around 180 services in the Gujarat sector, “With this, 100 trains have been cancelled, 40 trains have been short-terminated, while 40 trains short-originated as a precautionary measure, in view of the safety of passengers & train operations, in view of cyclone Biparjoy,” said Sumit Thakur, Chief Public Relations Officer of Western Railway.
▶The Gujarat government had deployed more than 200 teams in Gir forest and Kutch district to respond to emergencies related to Asiatic lions and other wildlife during the landfall of cyclone Biparjoy, an official said on Friday. One of the teams rescued two lion cubs that had fallen into an open well in Jasadhar Range of Gir East division during the cyclone’s landfall on Thursday evening, the official said.
▶NDRF teams have been deployed in Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Karnataka. “As the storm weakens and turns into a deep depression, it is likely to rain over South Rajasthan. At the request of the Rajasthan government, we have sent a team to Jalore. Apart from this, we have four teams deployed in Karnataka and five teams in Maharashtra,” said Atul Karwal, NDRF DG.
▶A sprightly shower accompanied by gusts of wind provided a much-needed succour to the national capital which had been reeling under sweltering heat for days. The pre-monsoon rain came under the influence of Cyclone Biparjoy and a western disturbance active over the northwest Himalayan region, inundating low-lying areas of the city and disrupting traffic flow.
▶The remnant of cyclone Biparjoy is expected to bring rain over parts of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh starting Sunday, and help the monsoon advance over east India currently in the grip of a severe heat wave, meteorologists said on Friday. The monsoon’s progress has remained sluggish since May 11 in the absence of any weather system over the Bay of Bengal. Cyclone Biparjoy impacted the southwest monsoon current, and its remnant is likely to move north-eastwards and give rainfall in central and east Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, they said.
▶ Meanwhile, Pakistan was ‘largely spared’ from the full impact of Biparjoy as it weakened into a cyclonic storm on Friday after making landfall in Gujarat. People in Sindh’s coastal areas, who left their homes amid cyclone threat and a warning of monsoon rains, are now returning.
(With inputs from PTI, IANS)
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