Ahmedabad: Hours after making landfall in coastal portions of Gujarat, cyclone Biparjoy's severity decreased from the'very severe' to the'severe' category, an official said on Friday.
The cyclone has proceeded to the northeast and weakened into a cyclonic storm; the authority predicts it will become a depression by tonight across south Rajasthan.
The Bengali word for disaster, "Biparjoy," brought with it devastating winds of up to 140 km per hour and relentless rains, causing trees and electrical poles to be uprooted and seawater to flood low-lying settlements.
Two cattle farmers, a father and son, drowned Thursday while attempting to rescue goats from a flooded ravine in Bhavnagar district.
Hundreds of trees were uprooted, communication towers were damaged, electrical poles were knocked over, solid objects were hurled, and dusty squalls were produced, making visibility nearly impossible in certain regions.
The power outage left several places in complete darkness. According to the official, 45 villages in the Maliya tehsil were left without electricity after strong winds tore down electric cables and poles.
Officials said that the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) had both deployed various teams to the impacted districts to begin relief and rescue operations.
At the State Emergency Operation Centre in Gandhinagar, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel assessed the situation and the relief effort currently underway.
The'very strong cyclonic storm' made landfall near the Saurashtra-Kutch coast at around 6:30 p.m. and continued until after midnight, the official said.
More than ten days after it began, the cyclone's eye was situated roughly 20 kilometres southwest of Jakhau port, 120 kilometres northwest of Devbhumi Dwarka, and 50 kilometres west-southwest of Naliya in the Arabian Sea.
Landfall denotes that a cyclone has crossed over land from the ocean.
The cyclone reached speeds of 13 kph when it neared the coast of Gujarat. The IMD reported that the wind speed was 115-125 kph with gusts to 140 kph as the storm made landfall.
The state administration has sent 631 medical teams to the eight affected regions, along with 504 ambulances.
More than 94,000 people from the eight coastal districts were relocated to shelters by Thursday evening, according to the state government.
Officials have stated that the Indian Army, Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard, and Border Security Force (BSF) have all been called out to assist with relief and rescue efforts alongside NDRF and SDRF forces.
On Thursday night, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called Patel to find out how things were going in the state after the typhoon made landfall.
The Prime Minister was particularly concerned about the lions in the Gir forest and wanted to know what measures the state government was doing to ensure their protection.
After storm Biparjoy made landfall in Gujarat, Prime Minister Modi and I spoke on the phone, and he asked me to fill him in on the situation there. In another tweet, Patel said, "He also asked what the government is doing to ensure the safety of all wild animals, including the lions of Gir Forest."—Inputs from Agencies