India has started evacuating hundreds of thousands of villagers living along its northeastern coastline ahead of a severe cyclone due to make landfall on Friday.
The state of Odisha has also moved in thousands of disaster management personnel to help those living in mud-and-thatch homes in low-lying areas take shelter from Severe Cyclonic Storm Fani.
“We are making best efforts to inform them about the cyclone and move these vulnerable people to cyclone shelters,” Bishnupada Sethi, the state's special relief commissioner, told
Tourists have also been advised to leave the coastal temple town of Puri.
Two decades ago, a super-cyclone battered the coast of Odisha for 30 hours, killing 10,000 people. In 2013, a mass evacuation of nearly a million people saved thousands of lives.
Tropical Storm Risk cyclone tracker labelled Fani a Category-3 storm on a scale of a low 1 to a powerful 5.