With memories of last year’s flood yet to fade away, Kochiites had to face another deluge on Monday morning with heavy rain pounding the city.
On Monday, Kochi woke up to a deluge with incessant rain that lashed the city since Sunday night inundating the roads.
Houses were flooded while bylanes and main roads were completely submerged. Office-goers struggled to get out of their houses while public transportation went haywire. With many buses keeping off roads, commuters had a harrowing time.
Online taxis and autorickshaws too avoided the flooded roads, further throwing life out of gear. Huge rush was witnessed at Metro stations with it being the best operational mode of transport available on Monday. However, the situation improved by afternoon with rain stopping, causing water to recede in many places.
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Hundreds of houses and even commercial establishments in the city’s business hubs like Banerjee Road, M.G. Road, Shanmugham Road (including Menaka), Ernakulam South and Edappally were inundated as rain, drainage and sewage water crept inside them, leaving residents and shop owners stranded, seething in anger and helplessness.
The unprecedented waterlogging resulted in most buses preferring to keep off the roads till Monday evening when water levels receded.
A good share of Kochiites preferred to remain at home since most arterial and byroads remained out of bounds for motorists and pedestrians due to intense flooding.
Good Samaritans were seen pushing vehicles that were stranded on waterlogged roads after their engines stalled.
Some of them erected barricades and pulled ropes across roads to warn motorists of danger lurking in the form of intense waterlogging, huge potholes lurking beneath inundated roads and overflowing drains sans slabs or having broken slabs.
Even parts of Edappally-Aroor NH Bypass used by inter-State vehicles and its service roads were waterlogged, posing risk to motorists and pedestrians, although NHAI collects toll from road users.
The torrential downpour brought back memories of the deluge of August 2018, following which 1,600 people had been shifted to nine relief camps.
The rain resulted in basement floors of numerous establishments, including shopping malls getting submerged.
The rain was so heavy that many parts of Willingdon Island and West Kochi were inundated.
Kochi metro trains operated as per schedule, coming to the rescue of stranded commuters.
A total of 60,387 persons travelled in the metro from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. on the day. The number was expected to touch over 80,000, KMRL sources said.
The average daily ridership is 60,000 since the commissioning of the Thykoodam extension.
