Gujarat: Heavy rainfall in state to continue for two more days

Mangalore Today News Network

Gujarat, Sep 11,2019: A highrise building in South Bopal locality of Ahmedabad city was damaged after it was struck by lightning Tuesday morning, even as most parts of the state were battered by rain on Tuesday. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast continued very heavy rainfall in almost all parts of the state on Wednesday and Thursday, Yahoo reported.

 

In Ahmedabad, residents of the highrise said it was the second time in the past four days that lightning had caused damage to the building. On Tuesday, a few vehicles parked on the ground floor of the building were damaged by debris falling from the uppermost floors.

Meanwhile, Gujarat has already recorded 113.5 per cent average rainfall this monsoon season, with 149 mm rainfall received during the month of September, rains lashed most parts of the state covering the southern, central, northern and Saurashtra regions of the state Tuesday.

A total of 184 out of total 251 talukas received rainfall Tuesday, with Visavadar in Saurashtra region s Junagadh district recorded the highest rainfall of 141 mm in the state within the 12 hours from 6 am to 6 pm Tuesday. This was followed by Gandevi in Navsari district and Choryasi in Surat, both in southern Gujarat, recording 114 mm and 94 mm rainfall, respectively.

Also, Sutrapada in Saurashtra s Gir Somnath district received 93 mm rainfall during these 12 hours while Jalalpor in Navsari recorded 89 mm, Dehgam in Gandhinagar district received 82 mm and Mahuva in Surat 81 mm rainfall

According to the IMD forecast for Wednesday, very heavy rain is expected in districts of south Gujarat, namely Bharuch, Surat, Navsari, Gandhinagar, Kheda, Ahmedabad, Anand, Vadodara, Dahod, Mahisagar, Chhota Udepur, Narmada, Dang, Valsad, Tapi and in the neighbouring union territories of Daman, Dadra Nagar Haveli.

Also, the districts of Saurashtra such as Surendranagar, Rajkot, Amreli, Bhavnagar, Gir Somnath, Botad and Morbi as well as Kutch are expected to receive heavy rainfall along with northern districts of Mehsana, Sabarkantha, Aravalli and Panchmahal.

Further, for Thursday, the IMD forecast states, Heavy to very heavy rains at isolated places with isolated extremely heavy rainfall very likely in the districts of south Gujarat namely Bharuch and Surat. Heavy to very heavy rainfall very likely in the district of Gujarat region namely Anand, Vadodara, Narmada, Dang, Navsari, Valsad, Tapi and in Daman, Dadra Nagar Haveli. Heavy rain very likely in the districts of Ahmedabad, Panchmahal, Dahod, Mahisagar and Chhota Udepur; in the districts of Saurashtra region namely Porbandar, Junagadh, Amreli, Devbhumi Dwarka and Gir Somnath.

Among the five different regions, Kutch has so far recorded the highest average rainfall of the season with 142 per cent, followed by South Gujarat with 123.22 per cent.

Among all 33 districts, 22 have already crossed the 100 per cent mark. These include Kutch district in Kutch region; Chhota Udepur, Panchmahal, Kheda, Anand, Vadodara in the east central; Surendranagar, Rajkot, Morbi, Jamnagar, Devbhumi Dwarka, Junagadh, Amreli, Bhavnagar, and Botad in Saurashtra; and Bharuch, Narmada, Tapi, Surat, Navsari, Valsad and Dang in the South.

Ahmedabad woke up to heavy downpour on Tuesday, with rain continuing through the day, leading to waterlogging across the city.

Keeping in view the IMD s heavy rainfall alert for Wednesday, the AMC has issued an advisory to residents to avoid going near river banks and low-lying areas.

The city received 3.4 inches of rainfall in the 12 hours from 6 am to 6 pm, taking the season s total rainfall to 28.76 inches. The highest rainfall was recorded in the city s southwest zone that recorded 4.6 inches, followed by the South zone with 4.1 inches rainfall.

All underpasses in the city remained functional and open for traffic despite the heavy rains, except Daxini underpass in Maninagar area, which was closed for traffic.

A total of 40 incidents of trees having become uprooted were reported from the city while water-logging was reported from 12 residential areas. The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation pumped out the water out in several areas.

Heavy downpour in the city also revived several lakes across the city. The water inflow in various lakes recorded on Tuesday was 5 feet at Vastrapur lake, R C technical lake 4.5 feet, Chandlodiya lake 5 feet, Saijpur 4 feet, Malek Saban 3.5 feet, and Kali 3 feet, while the remaining 25 lakes in various locations recorded between 2 to 3 feet of water.

Due to the heavy rainfall, five gates of the Vasana barrage were opened 3 to 4 feet in order to maintain the water level of Sabarmati river at 127.5 feet. The AMC was in continuous touch with officials from the irrigation department and kept an eye on the water level.