Bengal flood: IAF chopper winches 9 marooned villagers in dramatic rescue operation
Forty-five-year old Paresh Mondal had seen people clinging to a rope dangling from a helicopter in movies, but never imagined that someday he would do the maneuvering himself to save his life.
On Saturday morning, Mondal and eight others marooned inside a two-storied house at flood-hit Pratappur village in the Ghatal area of West Midnapore were winched up by a rescue team of the Indian Air Force.
Seven children were among those airlifted from the flood-ravaged village using winch in a heart-stopping rescue operation.
The villagers moved into the building on Wednesday when rest of the houses in Pratappur got inundated following a breach in embankment on the Silabati river.
Thirteen persons have died since July 21 and more than 23 lakh people are affected in over 165 villages in the 11 flood-hit districts of the state.
Nearly 45,000 people have taken shelter in over 2,000 relief camps set up in the affected districts.
The West Midnapore district magistrate sought help from the air force on Friday to evacuate villagers trapped in the Pratappur building after speedboats deployed by the local administration failed to reach the building because of strong current in the flood water.
The Russian Mi5 V5 helicopter from Barrackpore air force station in the North 24 Parganas district was used in the first-of-its-kind rescue operation in Bengal.
Since there was no place to land and the house was surrounded by tall trees, the pilots had to hover over the old building at the fixed spot and altitude.
IAF personnel made their first rescue attempt on Friday. But completely alien to such rescue operations, people trapped inside the building wanted to wait for boats.
“To build their confidence, the rescue team demonstrated the whole process winching up a policeman and a local youth but still nobody was coming forward. Since it was getting dark the helicopter returned to Barrackpore,” said an Eastern Command spokesperson.
“I am still shaking at the thought of hanging so high. But ultimately we made it. There are more people in the house and some of them were very old. They refused to leave. Probably they were too scared to hang in mid air,” said Mandal.
“We spent sleepless nights in the house, fearing that it would collapse any moment. The waves kept hammering its old walls,” he added.
“Some people are still trapped in that house in Pratappur. They refused to be airlifted like the others. Apparently they are too scared”, said Bharati Ghosh, police chief of West Midnapore.
Arpita Mondal, another rescued villager, was in a state of shock. “All I can say is I am alive. Nothing else matters,” she exclaimed.
They were taken to a safe place near Ghatal town, about nine km from Pratappur. People from flood-hit Manoharpur, Rasulpur and Harisingpur were also taken to safe areas.
A second helicopter was used in the afternoon to airdrop food and provisions.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/india...e-operation/story-JB59cdukNbVVoBKTFbeGiK.html
12 National Highways to double up as emergency landing airstrips for rescue operation teams
The Indian Air force (IAF) has cleared 12 National Highways (NHs) as emergency landing airstrips that will enable rescue operation teams to reach affected areas easily, an official responsible for executing the project said. Although there was initially a proposal to develop a total of 21 NHs into airstrips, for now 12 highways have been cleared, with three of those connecting Odisha, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh — all Maoist-affected areas, which also witness vagaries of nature like floods and cyclones almost every year. “The IAF has given clearance to 12 NHs to be developed into emergency landing airstrips out of the total 21. However, on the remaining NHs, discussions and testing are on and soon they too are likely to be cleared by the IAF,” a senior government official, requesting anonymity, told IANS.
Despite repeated attempts, the IAF had no comment to offer on the project and on related issues like the facilities to be put in place if the highways are to be used in times of emergencies. To start with, the thickness of tar will be increased and highways will be made strong enough for aircraft to land. “The highways will be open for public during normal times, but in case there is an emergency, then normal traffic will be blocked and the stretch will be used for aircraft landing. Also, alternate ways will be created for the normal traffic flow during emergencies,” said the official.
According to the Ministry of Road, Transport, Highways and Shipping (MoRTH), the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has been chosen as the executing agency. “In all, 17 highways were assigned to the NHAI, but after a joint survey, we found that airstrips can be developed only on 12 of the NHs. The BoQ (bill of quantities) has been prepared and we are waiting for approval from the competent authority on when to start,” NHAI Chairman Deepak Kumar told IANS.
Asked specifically how long it would take for the work to commence, Kumar, who was appointed recently to head the national road construction agency, said: “The work is expected to start in the next three-four months.” One major reason behind the initiative is to strategically operate in places prone to natural calamities and where relief work cannot be carried out without the help of choppers or aircraft. Among the 12 NHs cleared for being developed into airstrips are: Jamshedpur-Balasore highway and Chattarpur-Digha highway — both touching Odisha –, the Kishanganj-Islampur highway in Bihar, Delhi-Moradabad highway in Delhi-Uttar Pradesh, Bijbehara-Chinar Bagh highway in Jammu and Kashmir, Rampur-Kathgodam highway in Uttarakhand, Lucknow-Varanasi highway in Uttar Pradesh, Dwarka-Maliya highway in Gujarat, Kharagpur-Keonjhar highway in West Bengal and Mohanbari-Tinsukia highway in Assam.
Others include Vijaywada-Rajahmundry highway in Andhra Pradesh, Chennai-Puducherry highway in Tamil Nadu and Phalodi-Jaisalmer highway in Rajasthan. Elaborating on the planning of the entire project, the official said that the selection of highways had been done in a way that the entire country could be covered during natural calamities. “The highways chosen in Odisha are connected to Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. Planning is such that within short duration, aircraft will be ready to land and the soldiers can be deployed to help during a natural calamity,” said the official, adding that such initiatives were in existence and had been tried during World War II.
In 2016, Minister of Road, Transport, Highways and Shipping Nitin Gadkari had announced the project and the formation of a committee to come up with specifications for highway stretches that can double up as airstrips. The committee will look into details like feasibility of the stretches, their length and breadth, among other issues.
http://www.financialexpress.com/ind...-airstrips-for-rescue-operation-teams/788365/
IAF airlifts patient in need of dialysis
The
Indian Air Force (IAF) pressed into service its
Cheetah helicopter to airlift a patient from
Abiyana village in
Santhalpur taluka of
Patan who critically needed dialysis on Saturday.
According to the press release issued by HQ SWAC Gandhinagar, on arriving overhead the site pilot Wing Commander Gautam Narain saw the
patient on the top of the roof of a house completely marooned amid flood waters from all sides.
"The pilot, having made an accurate assessment of the situation and bearing in mind the importance of saving the life at stake, brought his Cheetah to a low hover, finally gently resting it on the
boundary wall of the rooftop. Assisted by family members next to him on the roof, the patient was lifted up over the wall and finally carefully pulled aboard the aircraft. All this, while the pilot delicately and very skilfully balanced the helicopter on its skids over the wall. The patient was then flown to Patan district headquarters where he was duly handed over to civil administration officials waiting with an ambulance at Patan University helipad," said the release.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...of-dialysis/articleshow/59836637.cms?from=mdr