Cyclone Gulab makes landfall, heavy rains likely in several places

New Delhi, Sep 27 (IANS) After making landfall, cyclonic Storm 'Gulab' on late Sunday evening moved westwards with a speed of 26 kmph and lay centred over north coastal Andhra Pradesh."The system centre crossed the coastline during 7.30 p.m. to 8.30 p.m., whereas the landfall process of the whole storm centre crossed the coastline as well as continued for a few hours after that. The landfall process completed after 10.30 p.m.," India Meteorological Department (IMD) said in its midnight bulletin.However, the system maintains its cyclonic storm intensity and is likely to move further westwards and weaken into a deep depression during next 4-5 hours.On Monday, light to moderate rainfall at most places with heavy to very heavy and extremely heavy rainfall (more than 20 cms) at isolated places is very likely over south Chhattisgarh; heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places over Odisha, Telangana and Vidarbha and heavy rainfall at isolated places over coastal West Bengal and north Chhattisgarh, the IMD said.
--IANS niv/pgh