Mumbai: For the second consecutive week, heavy rain lashed Mumbai, Thane, Palghar, Raigad and Ratnagiri hitting normal life and road traffic, though suburban trains and flights continued to function with some delays, officials said here on Saturday.
Mumbai, which has been experiencing virtually incessant rain since 10 days, witnessed heavy downpour since midnight, with many low-lying areas in the city and suburbs, subways and arterial roads submerged under three-four feet of water, severely disrupting traffic.
Waterlogging was reported in many areas.
In Mumbai, several areas in Borivali, Kandivali, Andheri, Santacruz, Khar, Bandra, Matunga, Parel, Dadar, Kings Circle, Sion, Vikhroli, Ghatkopar, AKurla, Bhandup, Mulund and other parts were flooded resulting in huge traffic snarls.
Subways were flooded stopping traffic movement in the east-west directions, and many vehicles and two-wheelers were stranded in the flood waters.
Suburban trains on both the Western Railway and Central Railway were running at reduced speeds leading to delays of 20-30 minutes owing to waterlogging on the tracks in the suburbs.
However, most flights were operating at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport with delays of around 30 minutes, according to officials.
In view of the continuing downpour, some schools and colleges in Mumbai, Thane, Raigad, Ratnagiri have declared a precautionary holiday to avoid inconveniencing students.
The BMC Disaster Control has warned people not to venture near the beaches as a very high tide of 4.90 metres will occur at 1.44pm.
In the past 24 hours, Mumbai city recorded 53.6mm rain, while Mumbai suburbs notched 133.1mm rain and the IMD has forecast heavy rain for the metropolis and coastal district for the next 72 hours.
Meanwhile, teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) were deployed in Andhra Pradesh’s East Godavari and West Godavari districts on Saturday due to a steady rise in the water levels in Godavari river.
More than 60 villages in the two districts remain marooned due to heavy discharge of floodwaters from upstream Bhadrachalam in the neighbouring Telangana state, where the water levels had reached 45 feet by afternoon.
Road connectivity to tens of village in Polavaram region of West Godavari district and Devipatnam mandal in East Godavari has been totally cut off.
Two teams each with 120 NDRF personnel have been positioned in the two districts to carry out rescue and relief operations.
Three SDRF teams with 124 men have been deployed in East Godavari and one with 34 personnel in West Godavari, according to the State Disaster Management Authority (SDMA).
Four college girls drown in Navi Mumbai waterfall
Navi Mumbai: At least four college girls, who bunked classes for an impromptu picnic, drowned in the raging Pandavkada waterfall in the Kharghar town of Maharashtra on Saturday, a police officer said.
The incident occurred around 11am when the girls skipped their classes to go to the picturesque waterfall along with six other friends. Three of the girls were studying in the SIES College of Arts, Science and Commerce.
The three girls have been identified by the college authorities as Aarti Nair, Neha Dama and Shweta Nand.
The fourth victim, Sneha Jain, is not from the same college. She has been identified by some of her friends who were part of the picnic group. All the drowned students are in the 18-19 years age group.
