VIJAYAWADA: With more water likely to reach Srisailam reservoir in the next two to three days due to continuous rainfall in the upper catchment area of Krishna river in Karnataka and Maharashtra, the officials started discharging over 4 lakh cusecs downstream to manage the anticipated flood. With this, the water in Pulichintala project, and subsequently at Prakasam Barrage, are set to surge, and the officials issued an advisory to manage the same.
According to Pulichintala project officials, the discharge from Srisailam to Nagarjuna Sagar at 7 pm was 4.03 lakh cusecs and the outflow from Nagarjuna Sagar tail dam was 5.5 lakh cusecs. “The outflow from Pulichintala is 3.77 lakh cusecs and it will increase to 4.2 lakh cusecs by 9 pm and further surge to 5.59 lakh cusecs later as per inflow to the project,” the officials said. The inflow to Prakasam Barrage has also shot up and is likely to further go up.
At 6 pm, Srisailam reservoir recorded an inflow of 3.98 lakh cusecs and has 215.08 TMC at 884.91 feet as against its full reservoir level (FRL) of 215.81 TMC at 885 feet. The Central Water Commission (CWC) issued a flood advisory noting that water to Krishna basin would increase further. “Since Jurala Project is nearly full, the releases from Jurala to Srisailam, Nagarjuna Sagar and Pulichintala dams are also likely to release excess water for another two-three days.
Further, River Tungabhadra is rising in Kurnool district which is giving additional inflows to Srisailam. Further due to rainfall forecast in Krishna catchment areas of Maharashtra, the river is likely to rise in the upstream side of Almatti Dam which may contribute to increase in flows in the downstream areas,” the advisory said. Tungabhadra is likely to continue to rise due to rainfall, the commission added. Due to very heavy rains in Kadapa, River Papagni, tributary of River Pennar, also has risen ‘rapidly’ at Kamalapuram, the CWC said. “River Pennar is also rising all along its course,” the advisory stated.