Cyclonic storm kills seven, damages 16,000 houses

AGARTALA/AIZAWL - At least seven people were killed and nearly 16,000 houses destroyed as pre-monsoon rains accompanied by strong winds and hailstorms continued to create havoc in Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur and southern Assam, officials said here Thursday.

According to officials, between Sunday and Wednesday night, a cyclonic rainstorm accompanied by heavy lightning killed three people each in Tripura and Mizoram while a woman tea worker died in southern Assam.

Tripura was the worst hit by this seasonal cyclonic rainstorm accompanied by heavy lightning. A 21-year-old youth was killed and seven others injured when they were struck by lightning. Two women died when their bamboo houses collapsed in different places in southern Tripura.

“Lightning and thunder, accompanied by high velocity winds, have lashed Tripura during the past four days, damaging standing crops and uprooting electric poles, telephone lines and big trees besides partially and completely destroying over 9,000 houses,” an official of the state relief department said.

In neighbouring Mizoram, over 4,000 houses were destroyed and at least 50 people injured in the cyclonic rainstorm across the mountainous northeastern state.

“The destruction of nature is more or less the same in all the eight Mizoram districts,” state Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla told reporters in Aizawl.

Three people were killed when homes and trees collapsed in separate incidents in Aizawl, Serchhip and Mamit districts.

“I have asked the ministers, senior officials and deputy commissioners to visit affected areas with relief materials,” the chief minister added.

The cyclonic storm swept through many parts of southern Assam’s Cachar, Karimganj and Hailakandi districts damaging over 2,000 houses made of bamboo and hemp.

“A tea worker, 51, died in Koomber in Cachar district of southern Assam when her thatched house fell on her,” a relief department official said in Silchar, the main commercial city of southern Assam.

The cyclonic storm also ripped through Manipur, damaging at least 800 houses and injuring 15 people, mostly women and children.

An official said Ukhrul and Imphal west districts were the worst hit.

Power and water supply have been disrupted after power transmission lines were badly damaged in Tripura and Mizoram.

There were also reports of damage to vegetables, a variety of horticultural crops, food grains and trees in many parts of these northeastern states.

“The cyclonic rainstorm would continue till the onset of monsoon,” meteorological department director Dilip Saha told IANS.