Sitrang kills 35 in Bangladesh : Cyclone made its landfall in southwestern Bangladesh coast

Cyclone claimed 35 lives alongside levelling homes and other infrastructures, uprooting trees and disrupting road communication and power supplies

PTI   |   Dhaka   |   26.10.22  : At least 35 people were killed and several homes destroyed as cyclone Sitrang ravaged Bangladesh’s southern coastlines and central parts after it made landfall overnight, according to officials and media reports.

Sitrang completed its landfall and weakened to a tropical depression over Bangladesh in the early hours of Tuesday, Prothom Alo, a Bengali daily newspaper, reported. Newspaper tallies and unofficial counts stated that the cyclone claimed 35 lives alongside levelling homes and other infrastructures, uprooting trees and disrupting road communication and power supplies. Around 10 million people were without power in districts along the coasts on Tuesday.

“Until 6 pm this evening, reports of 35 deaths were reported from 16 (of the 64 administrative) districts,” the mass-circulation Prothom Alo said, but officials preferred several of the deaths as “missing cases”, confirming so far 16 deaths. Another prominent news website bdnews24.com stated that the death toll from cyclone Sitrang till Tuesday evening was 22.

The cyclone made its landfall in southwestern Bangladesh coast but media reports said that the highest number of deaths were reported from southwestern Chattogram coastlines where a sand-laden dredger sank in the Bay of Bengal drowning eight workers as strong wind flipped the vessel. Over a million people were evacuated to cyclone shelters on coastlines but deaths were reported from areas in central Bangladesh as well since strong winds collapsed houses and uprooted trees causing casualties. A family of three — the parents and their minor child — perished as a tree fell on them in central Cumilla while the storm took a prison van off the road killing 2 policemen.