Three boats removed from Krishna at Prakasam barrage

Vijayawada : After two weeks of struggle, three boats which crashed into the Prakasam barrage crest gates during the heavy floods earlier this month were removed on Saturday. The water resources department had strived hard and successfully completed the operation.

The three boats crashed on September 1 during the Krishna river floods. After decrease in inflows into Prakasam barrage, the water resources department began Operation Boats to remove them from the flood waters. After two attempts had failed, the engineers successfully removed the boats from barrage in the third attempt. Two big boats were connected by H shaped solid iron girders and were linked to the boats and pulled one by one. Chain pullers were used to pull the boats which were taken to Punnami ghat on Saturday.

The water resources department initially tried to pull out the boats, each weighing 40-50 tonnes, using heavy cranes. Due to heavy weight and inflows of flood water, the boats did not move. Later, scuba divers were roped in and attempts were made to cut the boats into two pieces under water. Due to thickness of the boat metal, the attempt too had failed.

Engineers planned to pull the boats by using air balloon technology in the second attempt. In the third attempt, two boats were connected with iron girders and three boats were pulled from the water one after the other. The water resources department has taken the help of Abbulu team and expert scuba divers from Vizag to remove the three boats.

Luckily, no major damage has been reported to the Prakasam barrage structure due to crashing of boats. The state government alleged boat crashing was a sabotage and arrested two persons. The boats were rammed at the gates of 67,69 and 70 on September 1 when all 70 gates were lifted to release the flood water.