Vardah spares AP heading towards Chennai

Vijayawada: After playing hide and seek with the weather scien­tists and the government mach­inery for more than two days, the cyclonic storm named `vardah’ at last changed its course towards Chennai by Sunday evening, sparing the Andhra coast.

Upset over the poor market prospects in the kharif in view of acute cash crisis, the farmers heaved a sigh of relief with the change of its direction. The storm has kept the administration on toes even as Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu spent most of his time holding disaster management meetings. Naidu has even deferred his Dubai visit to gear up the machinery to face the situation.

According to a weather bulletin released by the Cyclone Warning Centre in Visakhapatnam, the severe cyclonic storm, Vardah over west central and adjoining south Bay of Bengal moved west-northwestwards and intensified into a very severe cyclonic storm on Sunday evening and lay centered at about 490 km east-southeast of Nellore, 480 km southeast of Machilipatnam and 440 km east of Chennai.

The system is very likely to move west-southwestwards and weaken while moving towards North Tamil Nadu. The cyclone is expected to hit Ponneri close to Chennai by Monday evening. Parts of Nellore are likely to receive rainfall with high-speed winds.