High speed winds and heavy rains lashed Mumbai and its neighbouring areas on Monday as the “very severe cyclonic storm” Tauktae headed towards Gujarat, uprooting trees and disrupting local train services here, officials said.
In view of the strong winds, the Bandra-Worli sea-link was closed for traffic and people were asked to take alternate routes, a senior official of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said.
The Colaba area in south Mumbai recorded a wind speed of 102 km per hour around 11 am, the highest for the day so far, IMD Mumbai’s senior director Shubhangi Bhute said.
Between 8.30 am and 11 am, the IMD’s Colaba observatory (representative of south Mumbai) recorded 79.4 mm rainfall, while the Santacruz observatory (representative of suburbs) recorded 44.5 mm rain, she said.
#WATCH | Maharashtra: Arabian Sea turns rough, in wake of #CycloneTaukte. Visuals from Marine Drive in Mumbai. pic.twitter.com/ovbFFJPruQ
— ANI (@ANI) May 17, 2021
Local trains services of the Central Railway were disrupted between suburban Ghatkopar and Vikhroli for about half-an-hour as a tree fell on an overhead wire while a train was heading towards neighbouring Thane, a railway spokesperson said.
Services on the harbour line, that provides rail connectivity to Navi Mumbai, were also affected after a vinyl banner fell on an overhead wire between Chunabhatti and Guru Tej Bahadur stations around 11.45 am.
The banner was removed after about half-an-hour and train services were resumed, he said.
Due to the strong wind, some plastic sheets covering the roof of the common passenger area between the suburban and main lines at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) were blown away in the morning, he said.
The area was cordoned off and the railway staff immediately attended to it, he said.
Despite the civic body’s claims of drains having been cleaned as part of preparedness for the upcoming monsoon season, there was water-logging in several low-lying areas of the city.
The Mumbai police tweeted about water-logging in six low-lying areas, including the Hindmata junction, Andheri subway and Malad Subway, crucial for the east-west connectivity.
A citizen in a Twitter post claimed a temporary pandal erected for vaccination in Dahisar was partially damaged due to the heavy rain and high velocity winds. However, civic officials did not confirm it.
As a precautionary measure, the monorail services in the city were suspended for the day, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) said. This was a “prompt decision” taken for the safety of commuters, the MMRDA said.
