Strong rains in Indian city leave path of devastation

A big storm hit the southern coast of India and caused a lot of flooding in Chennai city. The city is having a hard time getting back to normal.

Officials are working to remove rainwater from houses and roads in the outer parts of the city.

Some people say they can’t get the things they need and their electricity keeps going out a lot.

At least 18 people have died in Tamil Nadu due to the heavy rain. Tamil Nadu’s capital city is Chennai.

Cyclone Michaung arrived in Andhra Pradesh state on Tuesday. A child died and the crops were badly damaged before the cyclone became less strong.

On Monday, Chennai got a lot of rain – about 24cm (9. 4in) The weather people in India say that’s a lot of rain.

The big rain made people remember the bad floods in 2015. Many people died in the floods in Chennai, a big city in India. Many experts say that lots of Indian cities are not ready for very bad weather because buildings were built wherever and the cities were not planned well.

On Monday, the Chennai airport closed for a day because its runway was flooded. Many trains were cancelled in the last three days. The flooding caused a lot of damage to businesses, including a company that makes products for Apple. It’s going to have a big impact on the economy.

Thursday, city workers in Chennai were using machines to remove water from the roads in the southern part of the city so cars could drive through.

J Radhakrishnan, the leader of Greater Chennai Corporation, told BBC Tamil that they took out as much water as they could after it rained for 36 hours non-stop. He said that by Wednesday night, most of the city’s floodwaters had gone down.

Over the last three days, many people were taken to safe camps because of the floods. Some were brought to safety in boats made of rubber and fibre. Officials are also working to bring back drinking water to some places.

Specialists say that too much building has used up a lot of the area where rain can go.

“Whenever it rains a lot, homes in some suburbs of Chennai get flooded because the buildings are built on swampy land near lakes and ponds,” said David Manohar, an activist who researches urban flooding, speaking to BBC Tamil.

Raj Bhagat P, an expert in analyzing Earth’s land and water, told Reuters that even though improved systems to carry away stormwater can reduce flooding, it won’t make much of a difference during very heavy and extremely heavy rains.

The Tamil Nadu government has requested 50 billion rupees ($600 million; £478 million) in temporary help from the federal government for the state. The Chief Minister MK Stalin wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that infrastructure has been badly affected.

Mr Radhakrishnan said that the authorities will look at all the places where the drains for rainwater were not working properly.

“But that takes a long time. ” “Now we are focused on rescuing people,” he said.

More information was provided by Saradha, Prabhakar Tamilarasu and Asfhak Ahamed in Chennai.