Chennai rains: How bad was October 15 downpour? Very, very bad
The highest rainfall was in Kathivakkam, which recorded a whopping 248.7 mm in 24 hours, while Alandur was the outlier with only 58.5 mm
Visuals from Chennai (Photo: Hemanathan M)
CHENNAI: The forecasters, authorities, and the people in Chennai, who were focused on the anticipated red alert situation on Wednesday, were shocked by the severity of the torrential rain on Tuesday (October 15), when the city was battered by very heavy to extremely heavy downpour.
The data from the Integrated Command and Control Centre (ICCC) of the Greater Chennai Corporation, which tabulated the numbers from 30 rain stations from the 15 city zones, show that five of them recorded extremely heavy rain (204.5 mm and above), while 19 others recorded very heavy rain (115.6 mm to 204.4 mm).
That is, of the 30 rain stations across the city, 24 had very heavy or extremely heavy rain.
The highest was in Kathivakkam (Zone 1, Tiruvottiyur), which recorded a whopping 248.7 mm rainfall in the 24 hours between 6 am on October 15 to 6 am on October 16.
Not too far behind was New Manali Town in Zone 2 (Manali), where the rainfall in the same period was 245.1 mm.
Perambur in Zone 6 (Thiru Vi Ka Nagar) recorded 224.4 mm; Kolathur, also in Zone 6, reported 223.8 mm, and Ayapakkam in Zone 7 (Ambattur) received 222.6 mm.
Such was the intensity of the rainfall that out of the 30, only five rain stations – Sholinganallur, Perungudi, Madipakkam, RA Puram, and Adyar – were in the “lower” category of "heavy rain" (64.5 mm to 115.5 mm).
The one that stood as an outlier was Alandur, which received only 58.5 mm, a good amount of rainfall which still paled in front of the fury that other areas faced on October 15.
Overall, the average rainfall that Chennai received was 158.2 mm, added the data from the Corporation.
