The city Corporation will be sending a 350-member team of volunteers to flood-hit Chengannur to take up the cleaning activities there.
The team will leave for Chengannur on Tuesday and camp three days there, with a plan to help clean at least 500 houses. The team of volunteers will consist of the local body’s green army, who have been mentored as part of the various sanitation activities in the city.
Each team will consist of six members. In addition to those who are entrusted with the clean-up activities, the teams will have those who have been trained in electrical, pumping and carpentry work. The Corporation has been collecting generator, jet sprayers, bleaching powder, chlorine tablet, masks, gloves, gum boots, wood cutters, pump sets, shovels and other materials over the past two days, to carry out effective cleaning.
A short training session on how to carry out activities in disaster-hit areas has been given through the Health department to these volunteers. A medical team, with medicines and other equipment, is also accompanying the team of volunteers. The local body has also put together a system to deliver all the medicines that it has collected through the collection drive in the past five days.
Medicines will be delivered on request to specific areas if a prescription from a doctor, attested by an official of the local body concerned, is sent to tvmmayor@gmail.com or on Whatsapp to 9388682432. The Corporation has till now sent 38 loads of flood relief material to various flood-affected districts.
The local body had opened 28 relief camps in the city, housing 2,148 people. Those involved in the flood relief efforts of the Corporation includes 25 health inspectors, 25 junior health inspectors, 750 sanitation workers and the green army volunteers. With the rain reducing in intensity over the past few days, most of them have now returned to their homes.
Camps closed
A majority of the relief camps also have been closed down. Now, four camps housing 518 people are being run.
The city Corporation will be honouring the fish workers from the coastal areas of the city at a function to be organised on August 23 at 5 p.m. at the Vizhinjam junction. They have rescued an estimated 20,000 people from marooned areas, drawing wide praise from across the State and outside.
The flow of relief materials to the Corporation’s collection centres is continuing. The Mayor has requested those who are donating to provide materials for sanitation, as the focus is now on cleaning up.