One killed as rain lashes Western districts

Residents were forced to spend sleepless nights as power supply was hit in most parts of the district all through Wednesday night. The sky opened up at night and it poured heavily for several hours resulting in tree falls and the death of a woman in wall collapse. Power supply resumed only on Thursday morning.

Villagers in Coonoor ended up facing a similar fate as numerous tribal hamlets were left without power following the rains. 

Tourists to Ooty faced hardship as Nilgiri Mountain Railway services were disrupted due to tree falls on the Ooty-Coonoor stretch. A huge tree got uprooted on the tracks at Hill Grove. The railways deployed men and machinery to remove the fallen trees from the tracks. 

Around 12,000 poultry were crushed to death after the shed of a farm collapsed in heavy winds at Kudimangalam near Udumalpet in Tirupur district. The farm owned by a person called Senthil had chicken, which were around 40 days old. He claimed to have suffered a loss of Rs 12 lakh due to the incident. 

In Avinashi area in Tirupur district, plantain crops spread over huge acres were damaged in stormy winds for the second consecutive day. Thousands of plantains were destroyed in heavy rains that pounded the district on Tuesday night as well. Similarly, vast acres of farmlands were also damaged in Mettupalayam area.  

Farmers said though they were desperately looking for rains to save the crops, heavy winds played havoc causing huge destruction to the crops.

A woman identified as Aishwarya died after an under construction wall of a house collapsed on her tiled roof house near Thaneerpandhal in Tirupur. She was fast asleep inside the house along with relatives, when the wall collapsed resulting in the roofing of her house caving in during the night hours.