As heavy rain continues to lash Kerala, the government announced on Thursday that the flooded Cochin International Airport would remain closed until August 26. The international airports in Thiruvananthapuram and Kozhikode districts will accommodate the traffic from Kochi, which is Kerala’s largest airport.
The state is in the grip of what has been called its worst monsoon in almost a century. The toll from the floods leapt to 184 on Friday from around 80 the previous day, with the state government saying close to 100 people had died within 36 hours.
While the full extent of the damage to Kochi airport is not yet clear, the shutdown of the facility is unprecedented. No major airport in India has had to close for 11 days due to rain. Ernakulam district, where the airport is located, received 124% more than the normal rainfall for the week ending August 15. News reports from the district mentioned people being stranded in their homes in areas very close to the airport.
The flooding of Cochin International Airport is an event foreseen. The facility, which opened in 1999, is barely 400 metres from the Periyar river. When the airport was built, a creek, the Chengal Thodu, that served as a distributary from the river and three irrigation canals that provide water to nearby paddy fields were realigned to make space for the runway, as a coffee table book published by the Cochin International Airport Limited says. The airport’s drainage system leads into the Chengal Thodu, which in turn is connected to the Periyar.
19/08/18 Mridula Chari/Scroll.in
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The state is in the grip of what has been called its worst monsoon in almost a century. The toll from the floods leapt to 184 on Friday from around 80 the previous day, with the state government saying close to 100 people had died within 36 hours.
While the full extent of the damage to Kochi airport is not yet clear, the shutdown of the facility is unprecedented. No major airport in India has had to close for 11 days due to rain. Ernakulam district, where the airport is located, received 124% more than the normal rainfall for the week ending August 15. News reports from the district mentioned people being stranded in their homes in areas very close to the airport.
The flooding of Cochin International Airport is an event foreseen. The facility, which opened in 1999, is barely 400 metres from the Periyar river. When the airport was built, a creek, the Chengal Thodu, that served as a distributary from the river and three irrigation canals that provide water to nearby paddy fields were realigned to make space for the runway, as a coffee table book published by the Cochin International Airport Limited says. The airport’s drainage system leads into the Chengal Thodu, which in turn is connected to the Periyar.
19/08/18 Mridula Chari/Scroll.in
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