Aila...Yeh Kya Kiya:(

No, the Sachin patent lingo bug has not bitten me:D

Aila is the name of the super cyclone which paid Kolkata and it's neighboring districts a visit...and what a visit it was.
It was the proverbial "came like a hail, went like the wind" sort of visit leaving everyone reeling behind in it's wake.

Kolkata roads were suddenly all green as more than 1800 trees were uprooted, yes I repeat 1800.
Approximately 300 deers were washed away from the Sunderbans region...More than 35 reported deaths...thousands homeless with no roof over their heads...just a summarized description of the newspaper reports of the destruction, of what Aila gifted us...Of course, what they didn't report is that Aila gifted more, it gave countless tears, an uncertain future, mental trauma, lost loved ones and what else not.


The state Govt. got it's first warning of the impending disaster @ 8 pm Sunday evening...the first meeting to discuss measures to be taken/rescue efforts was held @ 12:01 pm on Monday afternoon...by then the wind was blowing across Kolkata, North and South 24 Parganas, Hooghly and East Midnapore with a velocity of approximately 100 km/hr.

It was supposed to hit Kolkata head on @ 4 in the evening...thankfully, though it made a landfall near Sagar Islands, swerved a bit off course and passed by Kolkata,only by 15 kms though....a close shave.
More importantly, it weakened considerably as it made it's way towards North Bengal.

The morning shows the day.....and it was a gloomy Monday morning that Kolkata woke up to almost as if the sky was suffering from Monday morning blues, soon the downpour started though it was just more than a drizzle initially with slightly strong winds...near perfect weather for the heavily scorched city that Kolkata had been the last month.

But there was to be a twist...soon the wind speed picked up, the drizzle became a downpour as news of the impending doom started to trickle in...a red alert was sounded for 4 o'clock with everyone being requested to get indoors by 2...pictures of uprooted trees falling on a car and an auto killing 2 people flashed on all local channels to heighten the dread...soon the electricity failed in many pockets, the cable connection went off and even cell networks got pretty strained...thankfully my net connection was working fine which kept me connected.

I got the shock of my life when two full sized bricks fell down on the road from the terrace of my building...Thankfully, no one got injured.
By 4 though the wind velocity reduced slightly and with news of the swerve in the course, the city breathed a sigh of relief.

Was out in the morning about 11 and it was quite pleasant then.....it was not so when we went out in the evening though. Uprooted trees, fallen electricity poles, live electric cables, billboards, hoardings, shattered window panes decorated the roadways, a sad sight indeed:(

There was little joy on the streets of the City of Joy then...only littered remains left behind by a rampaging marauder and swift winds which threatened even then to blow away the debris for further destruction.