Super Cyclone Amphan begins making landfall with wind speed of 155 to 165 kmph [Watch]

Super Cyclone Amphan has started making landfall in West Bengal and Odisha with a wind speed of 155 kmph to 165 kmph blowing to 185 kmph as an extremely severe cyclone.

It will make its way across the West Bengal-Bangladesh coast between Digha in Bengal’s East Midnapore district and Hatiya Island in Bangladesh.

“Yes it has begun landfall as an extremely severe cyclonic storm. Its trajectory is being tracked,” said M Rajeevan Nair, secretary, ministry of earth sciences.

As maintained by IMD’s glossary a storm is categorized as a super cyclone when wind speed becomes more exceeds 222 kmph.

After the landfall the cyclone is likely to proceed towards north-northeastwards, across Gangetic West Bengal & Bangladesh and weaken bit by bit. It is likely to maintain the intensity of Cyclonic Storm till 21st May and after that it will weaken into a Deep Depression over Bangladesh.

As of 1 pm, cyclone Amphan was at 150 km east-northeast of Paradip, 95 k south-southeast of Digha. During landfall close to Sagar Island, the severity of the cyclone is estimated to be around 155 kmph to 165 kmph blowing upto 185 kmph.

The surge in storm is likely to flood low land areas of south and north 24 Paranas and parts of East Midnapore in the time of landfall.

Wind speed in Kolkata, Hooghly and Howrah districts are likely to be in between 110kmph to 120kmph blowing to 130kmph that may cause extensive damage.

Amphan is expected to lead to heavy rainfall over West Bengal and coastal Odisha on Wednesday. It will also cause rainfalls over sub-Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim on Wednesday, Meghalaya on Thursday.

India weather dapartment is expecting extensive damage to establishments, roads, rail, farms, plantations, ships, boats and so on.

National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) director-general SN Pradhan stated on Tuesday that all preventative measures have been taken and people from low land areas have been asked to move out.

“The biggest challenge is that we are facing two disasters together — coronavirus disease (Covid-19) outbreak and cyclone Amphan. We’ve been spreading awareness about both Covid-19 and the cyclone while evacuating people. If a cyclone shelter has a capacity of 1,000, we can only accommodate half of that in a bid to maintain social distancing norms,” he added.

“One of the most important factors is the storm surge that comes with the landfall. IMD and Indian National Centre for Ocean Information have forecasted a storm surge of about 4-6 metres above the tidal level. This could have an impact on the coastal areas and also raise the river levels,” said Roxy Mathew Koll, Climate scientist at Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology.

Also Read: Cyclone Amphan: Some of history's deadliest storms that were formed in Bay of Bengal