Hirakud Dam To Release Season’s First Floodwaters Tomorrow

Sambalpur: The Sambalpur district administration on Wednesday warned the people in the low-lying areas of Mahanadi not to venture into the river. The reason: The Hirakud dam authorities will be releasing the first floodwaters of the river on Thursday.

Talking to mediapersons here, chief engineer of Hirakud Dam and Mahanadi Upper Basin, Sunil Nayak said the inflow volume of the floodwaters into the reservoir has gone up due to heavy rainfall in the upper catchments of the dam and the water level of the dam has crossed 615 feet as against its optimum level of 630 feet.

“As per the Rule Curve, we cannot hold the water for long and therefore, have decided to release the first floodwaters from the sluice gate number -7 anytime after 10 am tomorrow,” Nayak said.

For proper management of floodwaters, the water level of the dam, the amount of rainfall in upper catchments, and the flow of water in Mahanadi tributaries are being constantly monitored in the flood control room every three hours, he said.

Nayak further said that while the inflow of floodwater into the reservoir is 68.899 cubic feet per second, 15,277 cubic feet water is released through the power channel, the Sambalpur distributary canal, and Sasan canal.

To flush out the floodwaters from the low-lying areas in Sambalpur city, the municipal administration also conducted a trial run of the two high-powered pumping stations at Balibandha and Binakhandi.