Mumbai, Sep 23 (UNI) Heavy rains lashed Mumbai and surroundings areas all night disrupting road and rail traffic, besides hitting the movement of people manning essential services in the morning, officials said here on Wednesday. According to the India Meteorological Department(IMD), till 0800 hrs, south Mumbai (Colaba) recorded over 14.78 cms rain while the suburbs (Santacruz) notched over 28.64 cms rain, from 0800 hours on Tuesday, but most of it during the night, averaging to 36.03 cms for the city.
The IMD Mumbai has forecast another overcast and wet day with heavy rain as the civic authorities urged people to avoid stepping out unless necessary.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation(BMC) Disaster Control said water-logging was reported from the traditional flood-prone areas of south and central Mumbai like Dadar, Wadala, Parel, Sion, Matunga, Worli, Mumbai Central, Kurla, Chunabhatti, Mazagaon, Masjid Bunder and Byculla.
Besides several areas in the suburbs like Goregaon, Malad, Dahisar, Kurla, Ghatkopar, Mulund experienced waterlogging, while the subways at Dahisar, Malad, Santacruz and Mankhurd were flooded.
Following an alarming increase in the water levels of Mithi River, around 50 people in Kranti Nagar slums of Kurla were shifted to safer locations early today and sent back home after the situation eased.
Many houses in low-lying areas of city were flooded, people waded around in knee-deep or higher waters, household articles either damaged or lost.
The Central Railway has suspended suburban services from Chhatapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus to Thane and Vashi. Special mail/express trains have been rescheduled, said CR Chief Spokesperson Shivaji Sutar.
Similarly, submerged tracks compelled the Western Railway to suspend all suburban services between Churchgate to Andheri but after the situation improved, the services were run between Churchgate to Bandra, said WR Chief Spokesperson Sumit Thakur.
“Heavy rains have been reported from Mumbai and Thane suburbs in the last 12 hours with some places recording 150 mm plus rainfall,” said K S Hosalikar, IMD Deputy Director General Meteorology.
BEST has also cancelled or diverted its operations on at least 18 routes around the city.
There were at least 8 big and small incidents of house collapses or wall crashes, a minor landslide in Jaifalwadi, Tardeo, around 40 complaints of electrical short-circuits, besides 12 incidents of trees or branches falling, but there were no casualties.
BMC has reported that all the seven lakes supplying drinking water to Mumbai are virtually brimful.
For the first time in 3 years, of the total capacity of 14,47,363 million-litres, the lakes notched a record total storage of 14,30,152 million-litres (98.81 percent), compared with 98.59 percent in 2019 and 93.61 in 2018.
With the season-end bounty, civic officials say there is comfortable stock to last upto Dec. 2021 and even longer with disciplined water usage.
