Record downpour in South Mumbai: 2 die of electrocution in rain mayhem
Two people, one of them a railway employee, died of electrocution amid the record rain that slammed the city, according to officials.
Two people, one of them a railway employee, died of electrocution amid the record rain that slammed the city, according to officials.
Shambhu Soni, 38, a resident of Anand Nagar in Dahisar (East), was electrocuted by a short circuit at 9.46am on Wednesday and he was rushed to Bharat Ratna Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar hospital in Kandivli, where he was declared brought dead. A railway employee identified by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) as Sanjeev, 22, was electrocuted to death while on duty near Masjid Bunder railway station on Wednesday. Officials said that the tracks at the station were submerged under 1.5 feet of water , following which Kumar got into the waterlogged area to inspect a pump placed by BMC. Kumar got electrocuted at 3.45pm and was rushed to Bombay Hospital where he was declared dead on arrival.
The exceptionally heavy rain of 331.2mm rain in 24 hours, accompanied by chaotic winds ranging from 70-80kmph, between Wednesday and Thursday not only broke the record for this season, but was the highest monsoon rain record for south Mumbai in 46 years and second-highest all-time rain record during monsoon, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Thursday. The highest all-time record was on July 5, 1974 with 575.6 mm rain in 24 hours. The Colaba weather station, representative of south Mumbai, recorded 331.2 mm (exceptionally heavy) rain between 8.30am Wednesday and 8.30am Thursday. This was also the all-time high one-day rain in August. Over the past 72 hours (August 3, 8.30am to August 6, 8.30am), Mumbai saw its heaviest rain spell this season with the island city recording 637.2mm rain in south Mumbai and 505.2 mm rain in the suburbs.
On Thursday, part of the second floor in a ground-plus-four-storey structure named Jayprakash building, near Siddhivinayak Temple in Dadar (West), collapsed on Thursday afternoon. The incident was reported at 12.30 pm, no injuries were reported. Part of a retaining wall collapsed due to a landslide around 11.30pm on Wednesday from near Tower of Silence on NS Patkar Marg, near Kemp’s corner. As a result, cracks developed in the road and this led to collapsing of around 40-50 trees surrounding the retaining wall. This also led to bursting of four drinking water supply pipelines.
BMC’s disaster management control room received 3,202 phone calls on its helping number 1,916 on Wednesday. Between 8am on Wednesday and 6pm on Thursday, 576 incidents of tree and branch collapses were reported across the city, of which 215 were reported between 8am and 6pm on Thursday, and 361 were reported between 8am on Wednesday to 8am on Thursday. Of these, 412 were reported in the island city, 78 in the western suburbs, and 56 in the eastern suburbs. A total of 25 incidents of partial house collapses were reported in the city between Wednesday 8am and Thursday 6pm. No waterlogging was reported in the city on Thursday. However, between August 3 and August 6, the six pumping stations with a total of 48 functional pumps, pumped out 17,145 million litres of water from the city. This is equivalent to twice the capacity of Tulsi lake — 8,046 million litres — one of the seven lakes that supply water to Mumbai.
Wednesday’s rains added 60,851 million litres of water to Mumbai’s seven lakes. The useful water content in the seven lakes as of Thursday was at 41.47% or 600,158 million litres, as opposed to 37.26% on Wednesday morning. There was no impact of rainfall on suburban local train services on the Central and Western Railway on Thursday. Slow local train services on the Western Railway between Mumbai Central and Churchgate railway station resumed on Thursday evening. Train services on the Central Railway (CR) resumed on Thursday morning. Twenty nine Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) buses broke down in the city after getting stuck in waterlogged roads on Thursday. According to BMC, by 8am on Thursday, there was no waterlogging in the city.