Sambalpur: With incessant rain at upper catchment areas of the Mahanadi, Hirakud dam authorities decided to release the first floodwater of the season Friday for the safety of the reservoir, according to a press release Wednesday.
No one should venture into Mahanadi during the discharge of water and stay alert, the dam’s chief engineer Biswajit Mohanty said in a statement.
Sluice gates of the dam would be opened from 10 am to 12.30 pm Friday to get rid of the excess water. The water level would rise in the distributaries of the Mahanadi following release of water, authorities said.
While no one should enter the river at that time, siren would be blown at the left spillway of the dam in regular intervals as a precautionary measure before two hours of the opening of the gates. The siren can be heard continuously for two minutes and then continue for 30 second in every 20 seconds interval during release of the water. The sound of this special siren would be different from regular siren, the release said.
The upstream of the dam received 21.26 mm of rain while the downstream received 12.42 mm in last few days. The reservoir received 92,328 cusecs of water every second and released 23,968 cusecs of water to its power channel. Similarly, Bargarh canal, Shasan canal, Sambalpur canal and Hirakud canal received a total of 4,160 cusecs of water from the dam.
The water level in the dam was 611.93 ft till Wednesday evening against its water retaining capacity of 630 ft.
On the other hand, Burla power house generated 121.792 megawatt of electricity while Chipilima power house produced 43.958 megawatt of power with the water released from the dam. PNN
