BHUBANESWAR : For a State that is routinely battered by fearsome cyclones year after year, no one leaves anything to chance. The Balasore administration and the people of the district that was in the direct path of Yaas too did not. The people there, however, were facing the landfall of a very severe cyclone for the very first time. They spent the night preceding the cyclonic event in dread of its devastating impact despite making all preparations, including massive evacuation from vulnerable areas.
The cyclone hit and passed. And as it did, a sense of relief prevailed among the people as well as the administration. Yaas did not wreak havoc on the scale as anticipated. “The ferocious winds hustled making a siren-like noise when the cyclone hit the coast. We had earlier watched cyclone landfall on television, but had never experienced it.
My tile-roofed house collapsed in the heavy rain after the roof was blown away in the storm. But mercifully, it did not leave a trail of destruction as other monster cyclones in the State,” said Shyam Sundar Dash, a resident of Rupkhand village, located close to the landfall site. Its neighbouring Barajdeuli village was also partly affected. Sarpanch of Avana panchayat Dayanidhi Majhi said nearly 15 houses have been fully or partially damaged in the cyclone.
“There is no loss of life as villagers were already taken to safer places. The region had never seen landfall of any cyclone before. But the damage was much less as compared to the landfall areas during Phailin, Fani and Amphan,” he said. Both Rupkhand and Barajdeuli belong to Avana GP. Yaas made landfall near Bahanaga, nearly 20 km south of Balasore, as predicted. It pounded the coastal areas of Balasore and Bhadrak with wind speeds up to 130 kmph and pumped heavy rains damaging many houses in the tidal surge, but was lenient in impact.
“It may be because the system had more gale-force winds on its right side (sea) as compared to the left (landmass) when it made landfall. The impact was, thus, much lesser on Odisha side,” IMD Director General Mrutyunjay Mohapatra told TNIE.
Night of fear fades into relief at day
But as the storm progressed in a north-westward direction, Mohapatra said, the entire coastal belt from Baliapal to Digha shifted to the right leading to tidal surge of about four metre inundating low lying areas in the coastal villages. The cyclone barrelled through the coastal areas touching seaside villages of Bahanaga, Soro, Remuna, Balasore Sadar, Baliapal and Bhogarai blocks.
Notwithstanding the fact that it lost intensity, the cyclone wrecked many coastal houses, shops in beach markets at Chandipur, Balaramgadi, Dagara, Chaumukh, Kirtania and Talasari while uprooting electric poles and trees. The human casualty was limited to one in Balasore district as over 1.82 lakh people from low-lying areas were shifted to cyclone shelters.
Tidal ingress in coastal areas entered several villages along the sea in Baliapal, inundating roads and damaging crops in hundreds of acres. “I had recently built a new house and the griha-pravesh ceremony was scheduled on June 4. But the high tides that battered the coastline entered my house damaging all belongings,” said Niasi Dalai, a resident of Talapada village under Balipala block.
People were seen wading through waist-deep water to collect their belongings in Chandipur, a major tourist destination, besides the fishing bases at Balaramgadi, Kasaphal, Kirtania and Talasari in Balasore district and Chudamani in Bhadrak.
Heavy rain damaged the Jamujhadi-Dhamra Road. Road restoration work was underway. Several boats and trawlers were also damaged. Baalsore district president of Odisha Matshyajibi Forum Kiran Kumar Behera said while more than 500 boats and 15 trawlers have been fully damaged, several are missing.
Balasore Collector K Sudarshan Chakraborty said 84 coastal villages were marooned due to heavy rain and tidal surge. Nine NDRF and four ODRAF units along with 28 teams of fire service personnel, deployed at vulnerable locations, cleared the uprooted trees and rescued people caught in the storm, he added.