Bhubaneswar: As Odisha braces up for very severe cyclonic storm Fani, the Odisha Government on Tuesday sought two helicopters and additional NDRF teams for evacuation of affected people to safety and to carry out relief and rescue operation.
The cyclonic storm is likely to cross Odisha coast ‘between Gopalpur and Chandbali to the south of Puri’ on Friday, as per the latest prediction of the IMD.
“We have requested the Cabinet Secretary to station two helicopters for air-dropping,” said Chief Secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi after taking stock of the State’s preparedness to deal with the disaster.
“As per IMD’s prediction, maximum impact will be on Odisha. The evacuation process will begin from Thursday morning” added Padhi. Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) Bishnupada Sethi, DGP Rajendra Prasad Sharma among many others attended the meeting.
The latest IMD bulletin said that cyclonic storm is very likely to intensify further and move northwestwards till May 1 noon and thereafter recurve north-northeastwards and cross Odisha coast between Gopalpur and Chandbali, to the south of Puri around May 3 afternoon with maximum sustained wind of speed 175-185 kmph gusting to 205 kmph.
It also predicted that storm surge of about 1.5 metre height above astronomical tide is very likely to inundate low lying areas of Ganjam, Khurda, Puri and Jagatsinghpur districts at the time of landfall.
Ganjam, Puri, Kendrapara, Jagatsinghpur, Cuttack, Jajpur, Khurda, Bhadrak and Balasore districts are likely to be affected under its impact.
