Weather office expects cyclone to make landfall by Wednesday; Sri Lanka, Nepal also issue warnings
\n KAKINADA
\nIndian authorities ordered nearly 100,000 people to evacuate homes in Andhra Pradesh and Odisha, ahead of a severe cyclone the national weather office expects to make landfall by Wednesday. Neighbouring Nepal and Sri Lanka have also issued weather warnings.
\nCyclone Arnab is forecast to hit India\u2019s southwestern Andhra Pradesh coast as a \u201cvery severe cyclonic storm\u201d, with gusts of up to 150 kilometres (93 miles) per hour on Wednesday morning at 6am GMT (11:30am Indian Standard Time), the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said in a bulletin.
\nTorrential rain lashed the coast in the port city of Kakinda as heavy waves crashed on shore.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve never seen anything like this before,\u201d Kotesh Kumar, 35, told AFP, adding the government warned people to stock up on groceries.
\n\u201cThere was a cyclone here three years ago, but the water didn\u2019t rise this much.\u201d
\nCyclones, called hurricanes in the North Atlantic and typhoons in the Pacific, are a regular menace in the Bay of Bengal and northern Indian Ocean.
\nThe storm season, however, has been turbocharged by the El Nino weather phenomenon that has caused unprecedented warming.
\nNeighbouring Sri Lanka, meanwhile, closed schools with warnings of torrential rain, with the island\u2019s Department of Meteorology warning storms could trigger flash floods and mudslides.
\nThe military has been placed on alert, Colombo\u2019s Disaster Management Centre said. Indian media reported that as many as 50,000 people have been told to move to safe areas in Andhra Pradesh, and 48,000 in Odisha.
\n\u2018Damage\u2019
\nNepal\u2019s disaster authority issued a warning on Tuesday, saying that as the storm travels inland towards the Himalayas \u2014 likely overnight Thursday \u2014 it will bring heavy rainfall as well as \u201ca high risk of heavy snowfall, snowstorms and avalanches\u201d.
\nIt called on tourists to avoid travelling to high mountain areas and advised those already there to remain in safe locations.
\nNepal is still recovering from a catastrophic August 26 flood sparked by a glacial mountain collapse, which swept away more than 1,400 people and left over 5,000 missing.
\nIndia\u2019s weather bureau said it expects the cyclone to result in \u201ctotal destruction\u201d of thatched houses and create localised flooding, uprooting of power and communication poles, and \u201cwidespread damage\u201d to standing crops.
\nIn Kakinada, police barricaded roads leading to the sea.
\nAndhra Pradesh State Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu ordered the storm to be \u201cconstantly monitored and advance precautions taken\u201d, his office said in a statement on Monday.
\n\u201cAdequate shelters and evacuation arrangements have been made,\u201d New Delhi\u2019s Cabinet Secretariat said in a statement.
\nThe neighbouring Indian state of Odisha opened 1,735 cyclone shelters and imposed restrictions on movement in landslide-prone zone areas, the state\u2019s information office said.
\nLocal media reported that Andhra Pradesh authorities ordered evacuations in key, low-lying areas and shut \u201call educational institutions\u201d in some districts from Tuesday until Saturday.
\nOver 4,700 pregnant women residing in potentially dangerous sites were moved to hospitals, according to The Indian Express newspaper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Weather office expects cyclone to make landfall by Wednesday; Sri Lanka, Nepal also issue warnings KAKINADA Indian authorities ordered nearly 100,000 people to evacuate homes in Andhra Pradesh and Odisha, ahead of a severe cyclone the national weather office expects to make landfall by Wednesday. Neighbouring Nepal and Sri Lanka have also issued weather warnings. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574684,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-574668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"yoast_head":"\n