Category One Hurricane “Vardah” Ripped Chennai, 10 Dead, Wrecks 13 OSV Newbuilds – left a BIG effect under the Sea!
December 2016, has been a bad month for the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Last week, the State lost its Chief Minister Ms. Jayalalitha. Before people of the state could recover from sudden demise of the Chief Minister, the coastal city of Chennai has been ripped by a category 1 hurricane, which the meteorological department named it as Cyclone Vardah.
The storm hit the densely populated coast of Tamil Nadu with winds of 140 kilometers per hour, causing widespread wind damage. Tens of thousands of people were evacuated from their homes as the cyclone approached, and flights and trains were cancelled. As the storm raged, trees and power lines were torn down and a number of vehicles were overturned. A total of 224mm of rain poured down on the city, causing significant flooding. This is much more than the average for the whole of December, which is just 146mm.
Coming to the impact of this category 1 Hurricane (Cyclone Vardah) on Marine industry& ports, it is to be noted that the cyclone was ferocious enough to wreck 13 newbuild OSVs which was under construction at Larson & Toubro’s yard. MFAME has received some images from Social Media of the damaged OSVs. It is to be noted that the Cyclone also uprooted more than 12,000 trees and knocked out most of the city’s electricity. The new builds damaged, comprise a mix of AHTSs and PSVs, all ordered by Halul Offshore from the UAE as reported by Splash. Undersea internet cables were also knocked out as winds measuring 192 kph battered the city.
The cyclone Vardah has not only brought in a havoc above the sea and the land. People of South India has realized that the Cyclone has caused a BIG effect under the sea.
Yes! – People of south India reported slow internet and found that some internet undersea digital cables has been affected. In a statement, Vodafone said: “We are experiencing challenges in fiber media backbone in Chennai due to this phenomenon and as a result internet traffic moving via Trans-Pacific Route may get impacted. This may result in intermittent degradation of services on our Internet Links.”
Airtel, too, sent a message that read: “Dear Customer, the cyclone in Chennai has impacted one of our undersea network cables which may affect your internet speeds. We deeply regret the inconvenience. Our engineers are working to resolve the issue and services will be normalised shortly.”
Many banking sites like that of Corporation Bank failed to complete transactions for almost 4 hours in the morning. The e-commerce site of Air India refused to process a Master Card payment and the Call Center was not much of help.
Experts who understand the international internet gateways — a key stopping point for data on its way to or from other networks — of India say there are two main ones — one in Mumbai and the other in Chennai. The Cyclone Vardah seems to have hit the Southern Indian gateway by hitting the undersea optic fiber cables.
There is a huge network of optic fiber cables undersea that transmit 99 per cent of international data. Unravelled, they can be thousands of miles long. While these cables are subject to threats from ship anchors, trawlers and the occasional inquisitive shark, natural disasters like a cyclone or underwater quake can also disrupt the workings of the cables.
Reports claim that Cyclone Vardah has been one of the worst ever Cyclone in the past two decades.
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Source: CNN, Reuters
