In a major relief to lakhs of people of Gujarat, the cyclonic storm ‘Vayu’ did not make its scheduled land fall on Thursday as it changed its course and drifted towards Oman. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) said that the storm has made a small deviation, skirted the Gujarat coast.
“It is moving over northeast and adjoining east central Arabian Sea. Heavy rains which lashed the coastal areas were likely to continue,” the IMD said. According to private forecaster Skymet Weather, the cyclone which at present is Category 2 storm may weaken into a Category 1 storm. However, strong winds and rough seas are expected to continue and may cause damage. The cyclone may impact the arrival of monsoon in Goa.
For his part, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh reviewed the Navy’s preparedness along the Maharashtra and Gujarat coast in view of Vayu. “Senior Navy officials briefed Singh at a meeting in naval headquarters during which he was apprised about various measures being taken by the force to deal with possible scenarios,” officials said. The railways has cancelled 86 trains and short terminated 37 others as a precaution even though the cyclone changed its course and is unlikely to make landfall in Gujarat.
“The cyclone is likely to move north-northwestwards for some time and then northwestwards, skirting the Saurashtra coast (and) affecting Gir Somnath, Diu, Junagarh, Porbandar and Devbhoomi Dwarka with wind speed of 90-100 kmph gusting to 110 kmph during the next 12 hours,” the IMD said in a release.
Pankaj Kumar, Additional Chief Secretary, Gujarat, said that although the IMD has informed that the cyclone has changed its course, “it may still cause heavy winds and rains, and so we are still on stand-by mode”.
“Cyclone Vayu is 110 kilometres from Veraval to the south-west and 150 kilometres from Porbandar to the south. The cyclone is moving towards the north and was crossing over Saurashtra,” he said.
The Chief Minister’s Office in Gujarat said Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to Chief Minister Vijay Rupani immediately after reaching Bishkek for the SCO Summit and inquired about the cyclone preparedness and assured all assistance and support from Centre to mitigate the effects of the storm.
Skymet Weather had earlier stated that the ‘Very Severe Cyclone’ might weaken into a Category 1 Cyclonic Storm from Category 2, though the wind speed will be 135-145 kms per hour gusting up to 175 kms per hour.
Gujarat has, meanwhile, already evacuated over 3.1 lakh people and the Union Territory of Diu that touches the Saurashtra coast has moved over 10,000 people to safety.
The Coast Guard has stated that the cyclone would take up to Saturday before it completely moves over into the sea at Dwarka.
Besides taking help of the armed forces and the Coast Guard, the state government has deployed 33 teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) (each having 90 to 100 personnel) and nine teams of the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) in 10 coastal districts of the state, he said.
In addition, 11 columns of the army (each having nearly 70 personnel), two companies of the Border Security Force, 14 companies of the State Reserve Police and 300 commandos are deployed at different locations in the Kutch and Saurashtra areas.
