The heavy downpour in the provincial capital caused flooding in the low-laying areas and disrupted normal life in the city, tripped 150 feeders of LESCO and caused traffic jams on the main arteries of road network and under-passes on Thursday. There was very thin attendance in the government and the private offices as the rain that started at 4.am continued intermittingly throughout the day.
The Met Office recorded 90mm rainfall at airport, 56mm at Jail Road, 64mm at Farkhabad, 68mm at Paniwala Talab, 50mm at Upper Mall, 65mm at Misri Shah, 72mm at WASA Head Office, 65mm at Lakshmi Chowk, 68mm at Allam Iqbal Town, 60mm at Samanabad, 45mm at Mughal Pura, 45mm TajPura, 61mm at Nishter Town, 59mm Ghulshan-e-Ravi and 64mm at Johar Town
The localities which suffered most included Shahdra, Data Nagar, Qila Lachman Singh, Dev Samaj Road, Tajpura, Chungi Amr Sidhu, Kot Lakhpat, Township, Nisbat Road, Samanabad, GT Road (from Eik Morya Pul to Co-operative Store), Ichra, Shah Kamal, Garhi Shahu, Wassanpura, Purani Anarkali, Mozang, Bagh Gul Begum, Allama Iqbal Town, Wahdat Colony, Gulshan-e-Ravi, Shad Bagh, Misri Shah, New Chauburji, Gulfishan Colony, Bagbanpura and Mughalpura.
The heavy downpour totally exposed the fragility of government's action plan to deal with urban flooding in the city as the drainage system collapsed to flush out the rain water. Machinery at 12 major pumping station and 63 lift stations could not be put into operation.
It may be added that Wasa had divided the low-lying areas of the City into twelve towns. As many as 492 dewatering sets were to be installed in the entire City reserving 71 for low-lying areas. WASA officials complained that LESCO could not maintain uninterrupted supply of power due to tripping of its feeder.
The emergency centres could not work properly at Rasool Park Icchra, Mehmood Booti Drainage Station, Leyton Road, Sheranwala Gate, Lakshami Chowk, Upper Mall Reservoir and other disposal stations, causing lot of hardships for the citizens. Residential streets also remained inundated while rainwater and heaps of filth, plastic bags and waste dumped on the roads worsened the situation.
Meanwhile the Met Office has forecast thunderstorm with gusty winds is expected at scattered places in Punjab, Mirpurkhas division and Kashmir, for Friday while at isolated places of KP, eastern Balochistan (Zhob, Sibbi, Kalat, and Nasirabad divisions), FATA, Islamabad, Gilgit-Baltistan, Thatta, Sukkur & Hyderabad divisions, isolated heavy fall may occur during the period.