Bhubaneswar: As cyclone “Amphan” hurtled towards the coast, heavy downpour coupled with high-velocity winds pounded coastal Odisha, uprooting trees and flattening fragile structures, officials said on Wednesday.
More than 1.25 lakh people have so far been evacuated from low-lying coastal areas and the process of evacuation was still underway in some places like Balasore on Wednesday morning, Special Relief Commissioner (SRC), P K Jena, saidIntense rainfall was recorded in several areas of Puri, Khurda, Jagatsinghpur, Cuttack, Kendrapara, Jajpur, Ganjam, Ganjam, Bhadrak and Balasore districts since Tuesday, officials said.
The extremely severe cyclonic storm lay about 120 km east-southeast of Paradip in Odisha, 200 km south of Digha (West Bengal) and 360 km southwest of Khepupara (Bangladesh), said H R Biswas, the Director of the Meteorological Centre, Bhubaneswar.
The current intensity of wind speed near the centre of the system stood at 170 to 180 kmph, while the wind velocity near Paradip was 102 kmph. Near Chandbali the wind speed was 74 kmph, he said.