Cyclone Murasu aftermath explained: what the storm left behind in Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and beyond

The crossing, and the long weakening inland

Severe Cyclonic Storm Murasu crossed the south Andhra Pradesh coast between Nellore and Narsapur, close to Ongole in Prakasam district, between 3.30 am and 5.30 am on Tuesday, 3 November 2026, according to the India Meteorological Department (IMD). Sustained winds at landfall were 100 to 110 kmph, with gusts reaching 120 kmph, and the landfall process itself had begun around 1 am near Ongole, the Andhra Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority said.

The storm did not stall at the coast. By 8.30 am it was centred over south coastal Andhra Pradesh, about 30 km north-northeast of Ongole and 100 km south-southwest of Vijayawada, moving north-northwest at 8 kmph. By 11.30 am it lay about 50 km north of Ongole and 90 km southwest of Vijayawada, with sustained winds down to 85 to 95 kmph, gusting to 105 kmph. By Tuesday evening it was centred about 70 km west-southwest of Vijayawada and 120 km southeast of Nalgonda in Telangana, on a track taking it towards Telangana.

The IMD's forecast through the day was a steady weakening: into a cyclonic storm, with winds of 80 to 90 kmph gusting to 100 kmph, by Tuesday afternoon, and further into a deep depression, with winds of 55 to 65 kmph gusting to 75 kmph, by midnight on 3 November. That weakening, officials stressed, did not immediately end the danger. The system kept dumping heavy rain as it moved inland, and the IMD warned of heavy to very heavy rainfall with isolated extremely heavy showers across coastal Andhra Pradesh and Rayalaseema, with heavy spells likely to continue for the next 12 hours.

Murasu was the second major cyclone to affect the region within a week, after Cyclone Arnab, which had already caused deaths, extensive flooding and damage to agricultural land in the same coastal belt. That back-to-back battering is part of why the aftermath matters as much as the landfall itself: roads, power lines, crops and embankments hit by Arnab were struck again before repairs were complete.

Torrential rain and a trail of damage in coastal Andhra

The districts that took the direct hit were Prakasam, Bapatla, Krishna, Guntur and Palnadu, where intense rainfall and strong winds arrived together as the cyclone moved inland. Reports from the ground described thousands of trees uprooted, hundreds of electricity poles damaged, fishing boats damaged, standing crops suffering extensive losses, roads inundated and temporary structures torn apart. Vehicles were stranded on national highways, and motorists struggled through poor visibility as heavy rain and gusty winds battered the region.

The rainfall totals underline how wet the system was. Kothapatnam in Prakasam district recorded about 16.4 cm of rain between Monday morning and early Tuesday, while Naguluppalapadu received 11.4 cm, Chirala 10 cm and Pelluru 9.3 cm. Heavy rain also inundated roads in parts of Vijayawada, disrupting traffic and leaving vehicles stranded in waterlogged areas. In Guntur, Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan's review meeting heard that some places had received more than 30 cm of rain within hours.

The IMD issued red alerts for Krishna, Guntur, Bapatla, Palnadu, Markapuram and Prakasam districts, and placed Nellore, NTR, Eluru, West Godavari and East Godavari on alert for heavy rainfall. Flash flood warnings were issued for low-lying watersheds in Bapatla, Palnadu, NTR and SPSR Nellore districts. The storm surge warning also varied between bulletins: one IMD warning put the surge at 1 to 1.5 metres above the astronomical tide along low-lying stretches of Bapatla, Krishna and Prakasam, while a later live update cited roughly 1.5 to 2 metres. Either way, the surge, combined with the rain, put the low-lying coast at risk of inundation through Tuesday morning.

Andhra Pradesh Meteorological Department director K. Nagaratna said the system was weakening but remained dangerous because of strong winds and heavy rain, and advised fishermen not to venture into the sea until Wednesday. In NTR district, Collector Lakshmisha said there were no major issues so far, though some families were shifted to relief camps as a precaution against possible landslides in the Mogalrajapuram area.

The toll so far: two deaths, Rs 344 crore and a battered harvest

By Tuesday evening, the picture had turned grimmer than the morning's first assessments. Andhra Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority managing director Prakhar Jain told PTI that at least two people had died in cyclone-related incidents in Andhra Pradesh, and that 12,230 people were sheltered in rehabilitation centres in the affected districts. Earlier on Tuesday morning, the same authority had said no deaths or injuries had been reported, so the evening figure superseded the morning one as fuller reports came in.

The preliminary assessment put the monetary loss at Rs 344 crore, Jain said. Standing crops across 52,459 hectares were damaged by the heavy rain, and 312 houses were damaged by the cyclone's impact. The state government was also actively monitoring 814 minor irrigation tanks, with 776 of them placed on high alert, a sign of how much water the system had pushed into the rural tank network and how closely officials were watching for breaches.

Those figures are preliminary, and officials said damage assessment was still continuing, particularly for infrastructure and crops. The final bill is therefore likely to change as district collectors complete their surveys. What is already clear is that agriculture bore a large share of the blow: a standing crop over an area larger than many districts was damaged, on top of the losses from Cyclone Arnab a week earlier, and the state government has said compensation and restoration are now the priority.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah spoke with Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu on Tuesday, reviewed the damage, and assured all possible assistance from the Centre. Naidu briefed him on crop losses, damage to property and the ongoing rescue and restoration efforts, and sought financial assistance to help the state recover from the impact of successive cyclones. Karnataka also extended support for relief and restoration work.

Relief on the ground: money, shelters and a WhatsApp helpline

The relief operation had been set in motion before landfall. The Andhra Pradesh government released Rs 37 crore to 17 districts for emergency response, evacuation, relief and restoration work. Of that, six districts, including Nellore, Prakasam, Markapuram, Bapatla, Guntur and Krishna, received Rs 3 crore each, with separate allocations for the other vulnerable districts. District collectors were directed to ensure food, drinking water, medical assistance and sanitation at relief camps, with government schools and colleges available as temporary shelters.

The National Disaster Response Force positioned 37 teams across five states, including 13 teams in Andhra Pradesh, and three NDRF teams plus one State Disaster Response Force team were stationed in Prakasam district alone ahead of landfall. NDRF and SDRF personnel were on the ground through Tuesday carrying out relief measures, and Shah said in a post on X that the Government of India stood with the people of Andhra Pradesh. Tamil Nadu also sent 500 electricity department personnel in 25 teams to Andhra Pradesh to help restore power.

For residents, the state activated a dedicated WhatsApp-based grievance facility through its Mana Mitra WhatsApp Governance platform, run by the Real Time Governance Society. People in cyclone-hit regions could send 'Hi' to 9552300009 and select the 'Services' option to report emergencies and civic disruptions, a channel meant to speed up assistance where phone lines and roads were disrupted.

With 15 Andhra Pradesh districts receiving heavy rain, the state government cancelled the leaves of Panchayat Raj and Rural Development department staff until the rains subsided, following a review meeting chaired by Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan. Officials were told to prevent breaches in village tanks and canals, strengthen weak bunds, shift people living near tanks to safety, clear stagnant water, chlorinate drinking water supplies and restore damaged roads and power supply as soon as the rain eased. The next two to three days were described at the meeting as the most critical.

Odisha: 1.65 lakh evacuated, and a state that largely escaped

Odisha's story is the contrast to Andhra's. The state evacuated 1,65,809 people from six districts, Ganjam, Gajapati, Malkangiri, Koraput, Kandhamal and Rayagada, and deployed 63 disaster response teams, 54 from the Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force and nine from the NDRF, along with Fire Services teams. A total of 592 relief centres were operational across those districts, according to Revenue and Disaster Management Minister Suresh Pujari.

The district breakdown shows how concentrated the evacuation was. Of the 1,65,809 people moved, 1,52,010 were from Ganjam, 6,279 from Kandhamal, 5,073 from Malkangiri, 1,101 from Koraput, 726 from Rayagada and 620 from Gajapati. The Ganjam administration had identified 2,94,752 people for possible evacuation and prepared 1,139 shelters, including 110 permanent cyclone shelters and 1,029 temporary facilities, with a combined capacity of 3,41,700 people, stocked with medical teams, drinking water, generators and essential supplies. The Chief Minister's Office later put the number of rescue teams deployed across the affected districts at 169, a broader count than the 63 ODRAF and NDRF teams.

In the end, Odisha largely escaped Murasu's worst. The Chief Minister's Office said no district in the state had been significantly affected by Murasu, and that the state had recorded an average rainfall of just 2 mm over the previous 24 hours, with Puri receiving the highest at 12 mm and Ganjam, Gajapati, Malkangiri and Koraput recording 10 mm or less. The IMD forecast heavy rainfall at isolated places in Koraput and Malkangiri till Wednesday morning, with thunderstorms and gusty winds in several districts, so the watch continued even as the immediate threat eased.

Odisha's focus has now shifted to the aftermath of both cyclones. The state deployed four IAS officers in Ganjam, Gajapati and Kandhamal as Additional Special Relief Commissioners to accelerate damage assessment, compensation and infrastructure repair, particularly for Cyclone Arnab's damage, and an eight-member Central team that arrived on Monday proceeded to southern Odisha to assess damage in Berhampur and other affected locations before returning to Bhubaneswar on Wednesday. District collectors were asked to submit preliminary damage assessment reports so the state could prepare a consolidated report for the Centre covering both Arnab and Murasu. Schools in the affected districts remained closed till 3 November.

Trains, flights and the wider footprint: Tamil Nadu and Telangana

Transport was one of the first things to break and one of the first to be put back. At least 19 domestic flights were cancelled at Vijayawada, Tirupati and Visakhapatnam airports on Monday as Murasu approached, with IndiGo cancelling 10 flights and Air India Express two, according to Vijayawada Airport director M. Lakshmi Kantha Reddy, and four flights cancelled at Visakhapatnam. Several additional services from Vijayawada were cancelled on Tuesday, and Tirupati's airport director said IndiGo had cancelled flights to Vijayawada, Visakhapatnam and Bengaluru.

On the railways, South Central Railway announced the cancellation, diversion and rescheduling of several train services on Tuesday, including services through vulnerable coastal routes such as those between Vijayawada and Chennai. By Tuesday evening, however, the South Coast Railway said train services in the affected areas were gradually resuming, with the cyclone that had hit the Vijayawada-Gudur section receding and restoration teams working round the clock to normalise operations after a safety review chaired by General Manager Sandeep Mathur.

Tamil Nadu felt the storm's edge rather than its centre. Heavy rain affected Chennai, Tiruvallur and surrounding areas, causing waterlogging and disruption to flight services, with 11 flights cancelled at Chennai airport on Monday and disaster response personnel deployed in vulnerable parts of the city. Telangana, meanwhile, lay on the storm's onward track: by Tuesday evening the system was about 120 km southeast of Nalgonda and 120 km south of Khammam, and the IMD's track took it north-northwest into Telangana as it weakened, with heavy rain expected along its path.

Fishermen were warned against venturing into rough seas until conditions improved, and residents in vulnerable areas were advised to remain indoors, avoid unnecessary travel and stay away from damaged electrical infrastructure and waterlogged roads. Those advisories stayed in force even as the wind speeds fell, because the rain and the water it left behind remained the main hazard.

What remains disrupted and what to watch next

The most important thing to understand about Murasu's aftermath is that the weakening of the storm did not mean the end of the disruption. The IMD's own bulletins through Tuesday kept warning of heavy to very heavy rain even as the wind speeds fell, and the Andhra Pradesh government's review stressed that the next two to three days would be the most critical, with tanks to watch, stagnant water to clear, roads and power to restore, and damage to assess district by district.

The open questions now are practical ones. How quickly can power be restored in the coastal districts where hundreds of poles came down, with Tamil Nadu's teams assisting? How much of the Rs 344 crore preliminary loss will grow as crop and house surveys are completed? Will the 776 minor irrigation tanks on high alert hold, or will breaches add flooding to the rain damage? And how fast will compensation reach farmers who have now lost crops to two cyclones in a single week?

For Odisha, the question is different: whether the huge evacuation, which moved more than 1.65 lakh people, can be wound down safely, with people returning to homes and villages that the Chief Minister's Office says were not significantly affected, while the consolidated damage report for Arnab and Murasu is prepared for the Centre. For Andhra Pradesh, the recovery will be measured in restored power lines, cleared roads, reopened schools and paid compensation, and in whether the Mana Mitra helpline and the relief camps reached the people who needed them.

What Murasu has already shown is the value of the evacuation and the early warnings. A storm that crossed the coast at up to 120 kmph gusts, dropped more than 16 cm of rain in places, and followed a deadly cyclone by days, left, on the reports available by Tuesday evening, two people dead in Andhra Pradesh and no district significantly affected in Odisha. That is a far better outcome than the storm's strength suggested, but it is not yet a closed account: the damage surveys, the tank watch and the restoration work will decide the final toll.

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