Coastal areas put on high alert

Ramanathapuram

Police closed the newly laid Dhanushkodi road for traffic and mounted surveillance on the beaches in the Rameswaram island and other places in view of the ‘rough sea’ warning issued by the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) for south Tamil Nadu coast.

A day after Collector S. Natarajan issued the alert, the Marine police of the Coastal Security Group (CSG) and local police visited the coastal villages and asked the fishermen not to venture into the sea for fishing for two days on Saturday and Sunday and advised people not to visit the beaches.

As pilgrims and tourists thronged Dhanushkodi and Arichamunai, the eastern tip of the island during weekends to take bath in the Indian Ocean on the one side and the Bay of Bengal on the other, the police, on the advice of district administration, closed the road for traffic for two days.

Water entered a large stretch of land, adjacent to the Dhanushkodi road, apparently after fierce waves hit the shore at the early hours. On Saturday morning, the sea was seen calm in Dhanushkodi, Arichamunai, Muhuntharayar Chathiram, Mandapam, Pamban, Ariyaman, Devipattinam, Kilakarai and Thondi areas.

In the evening, the sea turned slightly rough in Dhanushkodi and Arichamunai but no untoward incident was reported. The warning was mainly for Sunday but we are on high alert since Saturday morning, said Mr. Natarajan, who inspected coastal areas in Kalimangundu and Agnitheertham.

Teams of disaster management forces with trained persons have been deployed at all strategic locations as part of the precautionary measures, he said adding the multi-purpose cyclone relief centres were also kept in state of readiness to accommodate affected people.

Despite repeated warnings by the police through public address system, people who visited the Agnithreetham sea for performing rituals and paying obeisance to their forefathers, entered the sea and took bath. They were, however, asked not to go beyond knee-deep water.

The INCOIS predicted that the sea would be rough near and low-lying areas in Kanniyakumari and Ramanathapuram districts and would experience surges intermittently from Saturday morning to Sunday night. Swell waves would rise up to a height of 2.5 to three metres, they said.