Marooned take boats to safety

7-FT UNDER WATER

V Ayyappan TNN

Nov 29, 2008

Chennai: C Sridhar was shocked to see water lapping onto the front door of his twostoreyed house at Chinmaya Nagar in Virugambakkam on Friday morning. There was very little water on the streets when he went to sleep the night before. Overnight water had overflowed from the Virugambakkam canal after sluice gates were opened to release excess water from the Chembarambakkam reservoir. Sridhar was among the thousands marooned by 7-ft high murky water in denselypopulated neighbourhoods of Chinmaya Nagar, Kulasekharapuram, Mathiazhagan Nagar and Mettukuppam of Virugambakkam; Venkatesh Nagar, Venkatesa Nagar, Jayalakshmi Street, State Bank colony and Dasarathapuram and Balaji Nagar of Saligramam; and the entire MMDA Colony sandwiched between Koyambedu and Poonamallee High Road. An overflowing Porur lake complicated the situation. The water from the lake overflowed residential areas to reach the Adyar river at Manapakkam. “I am taking my wife to the hospital,” said Sridhar as he climbed onto a fibre boat that had arrived to rescue the residents. “We will take you to the Chinmaya Nagar bus stand where the water is just knee deep. You can wade through and reach 100 Feet Road in Koyambedu,” said a police constable coordinating the rescue operation. The bus stand has become the transit point for residents fleeing their homes. Apart from the boat, four catamarans brought in Corporation-owned lorries were also used to ferry hundreds of people to safety. The boatmen had a tough time manoeuvring the boat to avoid ramming into submerged cars parked on either side of the flooded streets. They could not help damage a couple of cars and motorcycles while attempting to dock the boats alongside the gates of houses to rescue stranded residents. “Priority is to save people and not the cars,” said Raju, a fisher boy, rowing his boat using a wooden plank. Those living on upper floors were worried if water would rise further. “Tell us what is happening. We can’t watch the news because there is no power,” said a resident of Amman Koil Street, perched on the compound wall of his flooded house in Kulasekharapuram.