Cyclone Fani: India evacuates 800,000 from coastal areas
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/may/02/tropical-cyclone-fani-india-evacuates-800000-people
Cyclone Fani: India evacuates 800,000 from coastal areas
Staff and agencies
Thu 2 May 2019 10.20 BST First published on Thu 2 May 2019 06.36 BST
India has begun the evacuation of 800,000 people and deployed emergency personnel as the countrys east coast braces for a severe cyclonic storm.
Tropical Cyclone Fani, located in the Bay of Bengal and packing wind speeds up to 205 km (127 miles) per hour, is expected to make landfall on the coast of Odisha state on Friday.
The states authorities said they hoped to have evacuated 800,000 people from the states coastal districts by Thursday morning.
Odisha has also moved in thousands of disaster management personnel to help those living in mud-and-thatch homes in low-lying areas take shelter from Fani.
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The neighbouring coastal states of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu have also been put on high alert.
Indias national disaster management authority (NDMA) said sea conditions were phenomenal over the west-central Bay of Bengal area.
Authorities at ports in Paradip and Visakhapatnam ordered ships to move out to sea to avoid damage.
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