Cyclone 'Amphan' rips through India and Bangladesh

New Delhi: More than 80 people were killed by the powerful cyclone that slammed into India and Bangladesh on Wednesday, wiping out thousands of homes and drenching low-lying areas in torrential rain, officials said Thursday.

Many of the dead were crushed by falling trees, electrocuted by downed wires or buried inside collapsing buildings as Cyclone Amphan pummeled the region, leaving a wide swath of devastation and grief.

The worst damage was reported in the Indian state of West Bengal, which includes the metropolis of Kolkata and many small, coastal villages where people live in shacks made from mud and sticks.

The storm ripped through there, and although many villagers had evacuated beforehand, as Indian authorities had urged, some had resisting packing into shelters because they feared the coronavirus.

Initially, Indian authorities believed that a combination of an impressive evacuation effort and the weakening of the storm as it swirled onto land had spared more lives.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, as the storm barreled up the Bay of Bengal, emergency crews plied beach roads, shouting to people through megaphones to leave their homes and go to evacuation shelters. Around 3 million people in India and Bangladesh heeded the calls and moved to safety.

The cyclone weakened further as it moved into northeastern India on Thursday, with a wind speed of 37 mph. The skies over many of the cyclone-damaged areas were clear.

Many villagers who had fled to cyclone shelters were still inside them; others were beginning to trickle back to their villages, only to find their homes smashed to the ground, scatterings of sticks and clumps of mud.

Authorities said it was too early to assess the full damage. Many areas were still inaccessible because of downed trees and blocked roads.Among the reported deaths, authorities said that 10 people had died in Bangladesh and at least 73 in India.

One of the hardest-hit places was the metropolis of Kolkata, one of India's oldest cities, with around 15 million people in the greater urban area.

Authorities said that the cyclone had killed at least 15 people there. On Thursday, its streets were littered with trees, and parked cars bumped into one another as workers struggled to clear the roads.

The eye of Cyclone Amphan had passed nearby, bringing with it 100 mph winds and nearly 9 inches of rain.

Bangladesh seemed to do better at getting people into emergency shelters. Authorities there reported evacuating around 2.4 million people; in India, officials Wednesday estimated that around 660,000 had been evacuated.

A resident making his way through the uprooted trees and water logged streets, in Kolkata.