Chennai heaves sigh of relief as storm veers

Chennai: “Chennai and suburbs are safe as the deep depression that brought heavy showers in the past 48 hours has moved away from Tamil Nadu coast towards Andhra-Orissa coast”, director of Regional Meteorological Department, S. Balachandran, told Deccan Chronicle.

The deep depression located over 140 kilometres away from Nellore (as of 8pm) will intensify into a cyclone on Thursday. If the cyclonic system develops it would be named as Roanu by IMD and under its influence both Tamil Nadu and Andhra will get moderate to heavy rains.

Chennai city saw 11.7cm of rainfall (as of 8.30am on Wednesday) breaking a new record in the month of May. The incessant rainfall has beaten the previous records dating back to early 90’s and has helped restore the city reservoirs to brim level, weather and Chennai metro water office sources said.

The city crashed one more record as Kelambakkam on Old Mahabalipuram Road recorded the highest rainfall of 22.6cm in the state for 2016. Mettupalyam in Nilgiris had recorded 22cms of rain in February. The Tamil Nadu weather blogger, Pradeep John said the city would have heavy rainfall activity till Thursday morning post which isolated rains would be experienced.

"Chennai would retain the pleasant climate with cloudy condition till Sunday post which the temperatures will jump," added Pradeep.

Astro meteorologist S. Ramachandran predicted heavy-to-heavy rainfall activity in Coastal Andhra districts including Nellore and Machilipatnam. Meanwhile, false reports and memes in social media platforms caused jitters among the residents as activists received umpteen rescue calls.

Volunteer of Student's Sea Turtle Conservation Network (SSTCN), Nishanth Ravi that rescued many lives in December floods admitted to have received a panic call from a Mudichur resident pleading for rescue of the family. "Many Facebook updates have misguided people about the cyclone activity," he said.