Storm Lashes Bangladesh Coast, Thousands Evacuated
Date: 16-Nov-07
Country: BANGLADESH
Author: Anis Ahmed
London-based Tropical Storm Risk said cyclone Sidr, a Category 4 storm packing winds of 135 knots, was heading north towards the heavily populated southern coast and the capital, Dhaka. The Dhaka international airport suspended its operations.
"From my window, I can see tins ripped off the roofs and tree branches flying under the sky covered with thick clouds," said Moulvi Feroze Ahmed, a local government official on St. Martin's island in the Bay of Bengal near the storm.
"It looks like the sea is coming to grab us," he said.
Sixteen Bangladeshi fishermen went missing after their fishing boat sank in Cox's Bazar, a resort town some 400 km (250 miles) southeast of Dhaka, a local fishing association said.
Rescued fishermen from Myanmar told Bangladeshi officials that 12 of their compatriots drowned at sea. They were among a group of fishermen aboard four fishing boats driven into Bangladesh's coast by the cyclone, rescuers in Teknaf, a town 500 km (312 miles) southeast of the capital Dhaka, said.
Cyclones can cause immense devastation in disaster-prone Bangladesh, a low-lying country of more than 140 million people, particularly from storm surges that can rise as high as 5 metres (16 feet) as severe cyclones make landfall, weather experts say.
Storms batter the poor south Asian country every year. A severe cyclone killed more than half a million people in 1970, while one in 1991 killed 143,000 people.
The storm started blowing fiercely at 5 p.m. (1100 GMT) at Dublarchar and nearby fishing islands and at the Hiron Point near the Sundarbans at 7 p.m. (1300 GMT), local officials said. The mangrove forests in the Sundarbans are home to the endangered Bengal tigers and the park is a World Heritage site.
Both areas have been hit by winds of up to 160 kph (100 mph), and weather officials told a reporter in nearby Mongla that these speeds could rise above 180 kph in an hour or so.
"Given the current speed, the core of the storm may pass through the Sundarban-Barisal coast into the mainland in about two/three hours, and then lose its strength," said one meteorology official at 1430 GMT.
Power and telephone links have been largely cut and coastal areas plunged into darkness, the reporter said.
Navy officials said many of Dublarchar's nearly 15,000 fishermen were believed to have taken shelter in the Sundarban mangroves, with their boats.
Rivers flowing into the Bay of Bengal along parts of the southern coast have all swollen and are still rising, water department officials said.
Some areas have been inundated by a storm surge of up to 7 feet (2.3 metres), and many thatched homes were swept away, disaster management officials said.
600,000 EVACUATED
Officials at Cox's Bazar said they had evacuated nearly 200,000 people to about 600 government and private shelters and asked others to move on their own.
Around 400,000 more had been evacuated from other coastal areas, disaster management officials said.
Nearly 10 million Bangladeshis live along the southern coast, which usually takes the brunt of cyclones, but the area has shelters for only about half a million.
Chittagong and Mongla ports suspended operations on Wednesday and moved ships to safer areas, port officials said. Chittagong airport suspended flights and moved planes away.
All schools and colleges in Chittagong and other towns in the storm's path have been shut down and fishing trawlers have been asked to return to port immediately.
The meteorology department raised danger signal number 10, the highest, at Mongla, Bangladesh's second main sea port, and number 9 at Chittagong and Cox's Bazar.
The storm was expected to hit India's West Bengal coast around midnight with wind speeds of up to 200 km per hour, said B.P. Yadav, a senior weather official."We have suggested evacuation of people from the region," he added.
India issued a storm alert for coastal areas of Oriss
