The Indus River System Authority (Irsa) has managed to store 10 million acre feet (MAF) water in the three reservoirs, Tarbela, Mangla and Chashma till 5th September after two good spells of rains in the upper regions of the country during past two weeks, Punjab irrigation engineers told Business Recorder here on Wednesday.
They said earlier the water experts had estimated that due to 43 percent less normal monsoon rains till 31st August 2012 and low temperature in the upper regions, the Tarbela dam on river Indus could only be filled 1510ft against its maximum level of 1550ft this year.
The irrigation water regulators expressed satisfaction that due to sufficient flows in rivers Indus, Chenab and Kabul, Tarbela dam has been filled up to 1544ft. "Since Wapda engineers have reduced pace of filling the dam to one ft per day lately to ensure safety of the dam at this critical stage of the reservoir. They said due to current spell of widespread rains up country, the dam will achieve its maximum level of 1550 during next six days. They regretted that ever growing sediments in the reservoir have reduced the usable storage capacity to 6.77 MAF which was 9.68 MAF when this gigantic dam was constructed back in 1974.
They said that pace of filling the country's second biggest Mangla dam on river Jhelum has been abnormally slow this year. Mangla dam is still sixty feet below its enhanced level of 1242 ft. On Wednesday, it was 1184 ft with the storage of 3.5 MAF water. The government had recently increased the storage capacity of Mangla dam from 5 MAF 7.5 MAF which seems impossible to be achieved this season, they added.
The Meteorological department in its special weather advisory on Wednesday said that yesterday's well marked Low Pressure Area is located over Madhya Pradesh (India) and adjoining areas today. This well marked low is likely to move north-west ward in next 48 hrs (towards Pakistan). Under the influence of this weather system strong monsoon currents would start to penetrate in Pakistan from Thursday, giving widespread monsoon rains with scattered heavy downpours in the country from Thursday to Saturday.
Heavy downpours would generate urban and flash floods in the vulnerable areas during the period. There is also a probability of Riverine Floods, particularly in Eastern Rivers., Met Office warned Rainfall (mm) recordd at 1700 PST during last 24 hours:-
Balakot-152, Garhi Dupatta-54, Murree-42, Muzaffarabad-39, Badin-38, Nawabshah-33, Shorkot-31, Karachi-30, Saidu Sharif and Sahiwal-25 (each), Rawalakot-22, Pattan-20,Chhor and Faisalabad-19 (each), Khuzdar-18, Lahore city -15, Jhelum-14, Sialkot A/P-13, Sibbi-11,Mir Pur Khas and Bunji-10 (each), Lasbella, R Y Khan and Malamjabba-09 (each), D.G.Khan-08, Mangla, Mohen-jo-daro, Kotli and Hunza-07 (each), Astore-06, Chilas, Kakul, Gujranwalaand Madi-Baha-Ud-Din-05(each), Cherat -04, Lower Dir, Gilgit, Khanpur-03 (each), Sargodha and Chitral-02 (each), Islamabad Z/P, Hyderabad, Okara and Bahawalpur A/P-01 (each),Sialkot city, Multan, Bahawalpur, Jacobabad, Skardu, Lahore A/P and Peshawar-Trace(each).