Incessant rains lash Mumbai; heavy spells predicted in 48 hrs

Rains continued to lash Mumbai for the third consecutive day today, slightly disrupting suburban train services, even as the Met department predicted heavy showers over the next two days in Mumbai, Konkan and Goa region.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has also issued a warning to fishermen not to venture into the sea in the wake of forecast.
"This good and sustained spell of rain is thanks to the offshore trough formed over the Arabian Sea off Gujarat coast. There is also an upper air cyclonic circulation developing over south of Gujarat and north Konkan," IMD Mumbai director V K Rajeev said.

Yesterday, the Colaba and Santa Cruz observatories in Mumbai recorded a rainfall of 26.8 mm and 50 mm respectively.
The continuous downpour has affected the movement of local trains to some extent, as they are seen running at least 15 minutes behind their normal schedule, although no train cancellations have been reported so far.
However, the downpour has not caused any major flight delays or cancellations.

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The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) claimed that the disaster management team and other departments were fully geared up to face the monsoon.
Deputy Municipal Commissioner (general administration) Sudhir Naik said the senior-most officials of all the 24 wards, deputy municipal commissioners, assistant municipal commissioners, engineering staff and other employees were on alert.

No major rain-related incident had been reported so far, he said, adding there was no need to panic.
BMC's own weather stations recorded 29.9 mm rain in the island city, 18.6 mm in eastern suburbs and 32.9 mm in the western suburbs in the last 24 hours.
However, from the point of view of water storage, the rains in the last three days were not enough, he said.
"There has been good amount of rain for last three days in the catchment areas, but this is not satisfactory, especially if we compare the today's lake levels with those last year," he said.

Therefore, the 20 per cent water cut will continue, he said.
BMC supplies water to over 1.25 crore population from seven reservoirs in Mumbai and Thane district.
The newly installed Britannia Pumping Station for the eastern suburbs, constructed at a cost of Rs 106 crore, was successfully flushing storm water from 10 chronic flooding spots, particularly Hindmata, Lalbaug, Parel, Byculla and Kalachauki, etc, and had reduced the chances of flooding in these localities, said Sitaram Bedge, deputy chief engineer.
The station has six pumps with the total capacity of discharging 36 cubic metres per second water.