First Time This Season, Srisailam Crest Gates Lifted

�Hyderabad/Kurnool: With heavy rainfall and increased flood flows in upstream areas, authorities at Srisailam dam have lifted three crest gates on Monday evening. This is the first time this season that crest gates have been lifted at the dam.

By activating the flood flow management system, the authorities released 28,000 cubic feet (cusecs) of water from each gate, amounting to release of 84,000 cusecs from the three of the 12 gates (numbers 6, 7 and 8) at the irrigation project.

The water level in Srisailam reservoir had reached 878.40 feet on Monday as against the full capacity level of 885 feet.

The Srisailam dam is getting over 4.51 lakh cusecs of water due to large inflows from the Jurala Project and Sunkesula Barrage.

The released water is going downstream to Nagarjunasagar. Authorities are closely monitoring the situation as heavy rains are lashing several upstream areas.

The Almatti reservoir is getting heavy flood flow due to heavy rains in Karnataka. The reservoir reached 1,691 feet as against its full reservoir level of 1,705. The dam authorities are releasing 3 lakh cusecs of water to Narayanpura Dam, which has reached 1,608 feet level as against full reservoir level of 1,615 feet.

The authorities are releasing over 2,99,620 cusecs of water from Narayanpura Dam. The Nagarjunasagar dam is still at 512 feet level against the full reservoir level of 590 feet.

The dams in the Godavari basin are still not getting inflows.

However, Laxmi Barrage (Medigadda), Sammakkasagar Barrage (Thupakulagudem) and Dummugudem Barrage have been getting enough inflows due to flooding of Pranahita and some other tributaries of Godavari.

The Sriramsagar Project is getting only 17,310 causes of water from Maharashtra in Godavari river and the dam level is at 1,075 feet as against full reservoir level of 1,091 feet.

The dam is holding 33 TMC of water against the full capacity of 80.5 TMC. However, the rains in Maharashtra and upper regions of Adilabad district, have helped Kadam Project to reach 6.42 TMC of water against 7.6 TMC.

Kurnool chief engineer Kabir Basha said that gates 6, 7, and 8 were lifted due to heavy flood flow, releasing 27,000 cusecs of water from each gate. Upstream reservoirs are also releasing significant amounts of water: 3.15 lakh cusecs from Almatti, 2.98 lakh cusecs from Jurala, and 3.21 lakh cusecs from Narayanpur. Additionally, Sunkesula reservoir is releasing around 1.50 lakh cusecs of water into Srisailam.

Following the water release, sightseers flocked to the area to observe the spectacle. Visitors express enthusiasm about the prospect of seeing the project with all gates open, describing it as a potentially wonderful experience. People from both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, who initially came to the temple town, are now visiting the reservoir site.