Cyclone Yaas crossing Odisha border, to reach Jharkhand Thursday morning: IMD

Cyclone Yaas is currently crossing the Odisha border south of Balasore and will reach Jharkhand on Thursday morning, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Wednesday.

IMD director general of meteorology Mrutyunjay Mohapatra said that the cyclone caused heavy to extremely heavy rain in Odisha in the past 24 hours and northern and coastal parts of the state are expected to receive heavy rainfall.

The cyclone, estimated 120-140 Km per hour wind speed made landfall around 9:00 am on Wednesday between Dhamra and Balasore in Odisha, special relief commissioner PK Jena said.

“It’s expected that by around 1:00 pm, the tail end of the cyclone will also be completely moving to landmass. It is making landfall between Dhamra and Balasore,” Jena said,

At around 12:30 pm, the IMD informed that the cyclone was likely to move north-northwestwards and weaken gradually into a severe cyclonic storm in the next three hours, and into a cyclonic storm during the subsequent six hours.

“Wind speed will decrease gradually, becoming 90-100 kmph, gusting to 110 KMPH during the next three hours and 60-70 kmph gusting to 80 mph during the subsequent six hours,” the IMD’s hourly bulletin said.