Evacuations as second cyclone in a week forms off India

KOLKATA: Indian authorities on Monday ordered the evacuation of nearly half a million people out of the path of a new cyclone heading towards the east of the country, just a week after another deadly storm smashed into the west coast.

Experts say storms off India’s coast are increasing in frequency and intensity as climate change warms ocean waters. The India Meteorological Department said Cyclone Yaas had formed in the Bay of Bengal and was expected to barrel into West Bengal and Odisha states on Wednesday.

Yaas could pack gusts of up to 185-km per hour as a "Very Severe Cyclonic Storm" ahead of landfall, the department said. Storm surges of up to four metres high were "likely to inundate low-lying coastal areas", it added.

Evacuations in coastal districts and the Sundarbans mangrove forest, a Unesco world heritage site, started on Sunday, West Bengal disaster management minister Javed Ahmed Khan said.

"We have to evacuate nearly half a million people... to schools (and) government offices, which have been turned into cyclone centres to provide shelter to these people," Khan told AFP. Odisha’s special relief commissioner, Pradeep Jena, told local media that evacuations were being planned, with the state also making arrangements to provide power back-ups to oxygen plants supplying hospitals treating Covid-19 patients.