WRD reinforces bund along Cauvery at Moolathoppu after a portion of retaining wall caves in

Retaining wall for a length of about 60 metres had caved in amidst heavy flow in the river

The Water Resources Department on Wednesday began reinforcing the bund along Cauvery river at Moolathoppu near Srirangam after a portion of the retaining wall built along the river bund caved in due to heavy discharge in the river.

The retaining wall was built in 2008 in the wake of the 2005 floods when a portion of the river bund at Melur almost gave away and required major reinforcement.

According WRD sources, a portion of the retaining wall, running for a length of about 60 metres, had caved in, triggering apprehensions of a possible breach on Wednesday. District Collector M.Pradeep Kumar inspected the spot and instructed WRD officials to initiate swift measures to reinforce the bund.

Later in the day, the WRD began reinforcing the bund with stone boulders. Earth movers were pressed into service. A senior WRD official said there was no cause for concern as the water flow in the river has come down and the bund would be fully reinforced on the stretch where the erosion had occurred.

On Monday, nearly 50,000 cusecs of water was flowing in the Cauvery downstream of Upper Anicut (Mukkombu) after over one lakh cusecs of surplus water flow into the Stanley Reservoir in Mettur was discharged into the river. The WRD had diverted about 73,000 cusecs of water into the Kollidam river at Upper Anicut, where the realisation touched 1.23 lakh cusecs on Monday.

However, the water realisation at Upper Anicut had since come down to 87,381 cusecs as on Wednesday evening. Of this, 58,713 cusecs was being diverted into the Kollidam and the flow in Cauvery was 27,783 cusecs.