At least 21 dead & 96 missing after cyclone Tauktae batters India with 115mph winds as country battles second wave

AT least 21 people are dead and 96 are missing after cyclone Tauktae smashed India with 115mph winds as the country battles its second Covid wave.

The Indian navy rescued crew members from a sunken barge and a cargo vessel that was cut adrift today off the coast of Mumbai after the deadly cyclone struck the western coast.

The navy said it had rescued 177 people of the total 400 on the two barges in the Arabia Sea.

Three frontline warships, maritime patrol aircraft and helicopters were part of the rescue operations and were scouring the sea, the Navy said.

Both barges were working for Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, the largest crude oil and natural gas company in India.

The colossal cyclone – the biggest to hit the region in decades – claimed lives across Kerala, Goa, Maharashtra and Gujarat as savage winds swept through flimsy homes and uprooted trees and electricity pylons.

Cyclone Tauktae packed sustained winds of up to 210km (130 miles) per hour when it pummelled Gujarat state late Monday. Four people were killed in that state alone.

Residents emerged from relief shelters on Tuesday to find debris strewn across roads, trees uprooted and power lines damaged.

In Maharashtra, six people were killed on Monday, as heavy rains pounded the coastline and high winds whipped Mumbai's skyscrapers.

Over the weekend, the cyclone had killed six people in Kerala, Karnataka and Goa states as it moved along the western coast.

The cyclone has since weakened, but the India Meteorological Department has warned of heavy rainfall for many parts of Gujarat and Maharashtra in the coming days.

Ahead of the cyclone, about 150,000 people were evacuated from low-lying areas in Maharashtra and Gujarat states.

S.N. Pradhan, director of Indias National Disaster Response Force, said social distancing norms were being followed in evacuation shelters and rescue teams were clearing debris from affected areas.

Both states, already among the hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic, had scrambled disaster response teams.

Officials feared the storm could endanger India's fight against the coronavirus, with supply lines cut, roads destroyed and lockdown measures slowing relief work.

The deadly weather system has exacerbated India's embattled response to a coronavirus surge that is killing at least 4,000 people daily, and pushing the health system to breaking point

Health chiefs have previously warned of an "inevitable" third wave of Covid as hospitals buckle under a “tsunami” of infections and soaring death numbers. Nearly 280,000 people have so far died from Covid in India.

In May 2020, nearly 100 people died after Cyclone Amphan, the most powerful storm to hit eastern India in more than a decade, ravaged the region and left millions without power.

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