Mettur dam level touches 120ft, district on high alert

Salem: Water level in the Stanley Reservoir in Mettur reached the full capacity of 120ft on Saturday afternoon. Following this, Public Works Department (PWD) officials increased the quantum of water being released to delta districts for irrigation to 60,000 cubic feet per second (cusecs) from 25,000cusecs.
Meanwhile, the district is on high alert and ready with contingency plans to face any flood-like situation.
People living along the Cauvery banks and in low-lying areas have been advised to move to safer places and relief camps have been kept ready to shift them, if the situation demanded.
According to a PWD official, this was for the 43rd time that the dam reached its full capacity since its inception in 1934. Last year too, the water level had touched 120ft. PWD officials performed a special puja on Saturday after the water level touched 120ft.
They are also diverting the surplus water through the dam power house, tunnel power house and Ellis Saddle surplus 16 number shutters. The dam’s special chief engineer A Jayagopal said, “The inflow to the dam is 76,000cusecs. We are releasing a total of 61,700cusecs water from the dam.”
He said while 700cusecs water is being released into the dam’s east and west bank canal for irrigation purposes in Salem, Namakkal, Erode and Karur districts, 1,000cusecs water is being released for drinking water purposes in Salem municipal corporation limits.
Salem collector S A Raman visited the dam and said more water would be released from the dam depending on the inflow.
He had on Friday night sounded flood alert to 12 districts - Salem, Erode, Namakkal, Karur, Perambalur, Ariyalur, Tiruchirappalli, Pudukottai, Thanjavur, Thiruvarur, Nagapattinam and Cuddalore - following the Cauvery began to swell with excess water being released from Krishnarajasagar and Kabini dams in Karnataka.
The collector said three marriage halls have been turned into relief camps to shift the people living near the river banks in view of the flood threat.
He said a team of revenue, PWD, police and fire and rescue services personnel have been deployed to monitor the situation.
“Officials are deployed along the river banks from Mettur to the district border. They are closely monitoring the situation. We have advised the people not to bathe in the river until further orders. We have also asked them not to take selfies by entering the river pathways,” the collector said.