DHAKA, BANGLADESH NEWS HEADLINES: - A super cyclone was bearing down rapidly on Bangladesh's southwest coastline, ripping off tin roofs from houses and uprooting trees, as hundreds of thousands were evacuated to safer ground. London-based Tropical Storm Risk said Cyclone Sidr was a Category 4 storm, packing winds of 135 knots, and was heading due north on a course that would take it over the heavily populated southern coast and then towards the capital, Dhaka. "From my window, I can see tins ripped off the roofs and tree branches flying under the sky covered with thick clouds," said Moulvi Feroze Ahmed, a local government official on St. Martin's island in the Bay of Bengal near the storm. "It looks like the sea is coming to grab us," he said. The storm started blowing fiercely at 5 p.m. (1100 GMT) at Dublarchar and nearby fishing islands and at the Hiron Point near the Sundarbans at 7 p.m. (1300 GMT), local officials said. The mangrove forests in the Sundarbans are home to the endangered Bengal tigers and the park is a World Heritage site.
Cyclones can cause immense devastation in disaster-prone Bangladesh, a low-lying country of more than 140 million people, particularly from storm surges that can rise as high as 5 metres (16 feet) as severe cyclones make landfall, weather experts say. "Given the current speed, the core of the storm may pass through the Sundarban-Barisal coast into the mainland in about two/three hours, and then lose its strength," said one meteorology official at 1430 GMT. Both areas have been hit by winds of up to 160 kph (100 mph), and weather officials told a reporter in nearby Mongla that these speeds could rise above 180 kph in an hour or so. Power and telephone links have been largely cut, but some mobile networks are working sporadically, the reporter said. Navy officials said many of Dublarchar's nearly 15,000 fishermen were believed to have taken shelter in the Sundarban mangroves, with their boats. Some areas have been inundated by a storm surge of up to 7 feet (2.3 metres), and many thatched homes were swept away, disaster management officials said. Rivers flowing into the Bay of Bengal along parts of the southern coast have all swollen and are still rising, water department officials said. The Bangladesh Meteorology Department said the core of the storm was now about 150 km (90 miles) from the Mongla coast and was expected to make landfall around midnight on Thursday (1800 GMT).
A CATEGORY 4 SUPER CYCLONE HITS BANGLADESH COAST LINE - 600,000 EVACUATED - BANGLADESH NEWS HEADLINES
Officials at Cox's Bazar, a popular tourist destination, said they had evacuated nearly 200,000 people to about 600 government and private shelters and asked others to move on their own. Storms batter the poor south Asian country every year. A severe cyclone killed more than half a million people in 1970, while one in 1991, which generated a 6-metre storm surge, killed 143,000 people. Around 400,000 more had been evacuated from other coastal areas, disaster management officials said. Chittagong and Mongla ports suspended operations on Wednesday and moved ships to safer areas, port officials said. Chittagong airport suspended flights and moved planes away, officials said. Nearly 10 million Bangladeshis live along the southern coast, which usually takes the brunt of cyclones, but the area has shelters for only about half a million. The storm was expected to hit India's West Bengal coast around midnight with wind speeds of up to 200 km per hour, said B.P. Yadav, a senior weather official. "We have suggested evacuation of people from the region," he added. All schools and colleges in Chittagong and other towns in the storm's path have been shut down and fishing trawlers have been asked to return to port immediately. The meteorology department raised danger signal number 10, the highest, at Mongla, Bangladesh's second main sea port, and number 9 at Chittagong and Cox's Bazar.
India issued a storm alert for coastal areas of Orissa and West Bengal on Thursday, Information and Broadcasting Minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi told reporters after a cabinet meeting. Paramilitary forces were on standby to deploy to affected areas.
