People hold on to a rope against the heavy flow of the floodwaters
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy reviewed the situation caused due to heavy rains at a high-level meeting in Hyderabad yesterday and directed the administration to carry out relief works on a war-footing.
With heavy to very heavy rains forecast for the next 24 hours, the Chief Minister asked the administration to be alert and take all necessary measures to provide relief to affected people.
The deluge caused by unabated rains in Andhra Pradesh during the last four days killed 20 persons and damaged crops in 4.34 lakh hectares, besides paralysing normal life, official sources said.
More than 68,000 people in the coastal districts of Srikakulam, Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Prakasam were evacuated from their homes and moved to 135 emergency relief camps set up by their respective district administrations.
Ten National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) teams reached the rain-ravaged districts and are engaged in relief operations.
The average rainfall in various parts of the state ranged between 4 cm and 26 cm in the past 24 hours.
Hundreds of houses were damaged in many districts rendering scores of people shelterless.
Rivers are in spate while drains and tanks are overflowing, leaving towns and villages inundated.
"The situation is very grim as the entire Delta area is completely inundated. Drains and tanks are overflowing and there is a threat of breaches occurring at some places because of the nonstop rain," Guntur district Collector S Suresh Kumar told PTI.
Six lift-irrigation scheme workers who were stuck in the floods at Chilakaluripet and Yedlapadu since Thursday were rescued yesterday with the help of National Disaster Response Force personnel, the collector said.
The Krishna river is in spate with a heavy inflow of floodwater to Srisailam Dam and Nagarjuna Sagar downstream.
While about 90,000 cusecs of flood water was being discharged from Nagarjuna Sagar by this evening, the outflow would increase once gates at the Srisailam Dam were opened, official sources said.
At the Prakasam Barrage in Vijayawada, downstream Nagarjuna Sagar, 70 crest gates were lifted to discharge 1.18 lakh cusecs (cubic feet per second) of water into the Bay of Bengal. Rivers like Bahuda, Nagavali and Vamsadhara in Srikakulam district are in spate after floodwaters flowed into them.
The flood resulted in snapping of road communication in the district and also in neighbouring districts in Odisha, they said.
Andhra Pradesh's capital Hyderabad too has been battered by the deluge in the last three days. Hussain Sagar Lake in the heart of the city is full to the brim and the level may cross the danger mark if there is more rain, according to a press release from the Chief Minister's Office.
South Central Railway General Manager PN Pandey informed the Chief Minister that some trains have been diverted and some slowed down but there were no cancellations so far.
The Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC) also had to cancel some bus services, particularly on routes covering cross streams and lakes as they were overflowing.