Chennai

[Thad E Ginathom]

Thanks, Linuxguru. She's not looking for domestic work; she was overqualified even for shop work, but hey, we all have to eat*. Hoping she can find some entry in systems/programming/etc, or, after her MBA, HR, which is what she is doing it in. If you hear of anything, drop me a PM, and I'll pass it on via my wife, who is the point of contact.

What surprised me (ha! Surprise is hardly the word!) about the canal rising so many feet is that, just a couple of days ago, it had been doing a great job of draining our area. They really should put a sluice of lock gate at the river, but I'm not expecting anything as people and property don't matter.



*A brilliant exchange I once heard with a candidate in an interview...

"You are considerably overqualified for this job..."

"Would you like me to go back and fail some of those exams?"

He got the job,, byt the way, and I had the benefit of working with his sense of humour for several years

 

[peace_sells]

I was in Ramapuram on 1st and 2nd Dec. There was 15 feet water on the road (I stay at one of the highest points in Ramapuram). My house (rented, 3 feet above road level) was on the ground floor. Everything got submerged. My laptop, clothes, my headphone, hard disk, a few sealed CDs (the entire CD and booklet got wet like there was no seal!), 2 LPs. Water started entering our flats at 2 am on 2nd Dec. Our owner (who's been living here since 1980) asked us to keep all our valuable stuff on top of a tall cupboard. According to him the water would in no way go above waist level in the house. Luckily it stopped raining on 3rd Dec otherwise even the first floor would've been fully submerged! Luckily we had a terrace so we could go up there and breathe some some fresh air. The rescue operation was very good in our area though. Choppers and boats kept coming. We kept on getting food at regular intervals. Water was the only issue.

It'll take a lot of time for these areas to recover. That damp smell is still there all around. Dogs and cats dead on the road. Unforgettable experience it was..

p.s. My Audio Technica headphone somehow is working just fine. Wonder how that happened Haven't dared to give power supply to the other drenched electronic items.

 

[linuxguru]

Sorry to hear about your experience at Ramapuram. Your landlord may not have been around during the 1976 flooding. We could see IAF (and Coast Guard) choppers heading towards that side for several days, so we figured it was in deeper waters.

The thing about Ramapuram is that not only is it on relatively low ground and near the river, I think that an old paleo-channel of the Adyar once flowed through Manapakkam, Ramapuram, interior areas of West K.K.Nagar, Virugambakkam, Kodambakkam and joined Long Tank at Saligramam. Most of these areas were agrarian areas pre-1940 (when Arcot Road was constructed, connecting Kodambakkam to Mount-Poonamalee Road at Porur), giving a clue that it is on an alluvial flood plain. Vegetation on either side of Arcot Road is said to have been Casuarina groves and Paddy fields, ground water is said to have been abundant, and a major irrigation canal once flowed through Virugambakkam (which was included within Chennai city limits only in 1977).

A further clue is in the 1909 map of Chennai showing Long Tank, before it was drained and reclaimed for residential colonies (including portions of Nungambakkam, T.Nagar, CIT Nagar, Mambalam and so on). In that map, Long Tank is L-shaped, with the short arm of the L beginning at Saligramam and the long arm ending near the present course of the Adyar at Saidapet. That indicates that Long Tank was an Oxbow Lake, and was itself the main course of the Adyar in the not-too-distant past (maybe a few 100 or 1000 years ago).

In short, the Adyar flowed North of the present channel, through areas that constitute the bulk of the residential areas of Central Chennai west of Mount Road, not too long ago. Not too surprisingly, those areas also flood easily when the Adyar floods (about once a decade on average - 1943, 1960, 1969, 1976, 1985, 1996, 2005, 2015). It wasn't a huge problem before 1969 or so, since the bulk of those areas were sparsely populated then, but they're now densely populated residential areas. Combine that with the rising riverbed of the Adyar over the last couple of decades, and there's scope for devastating inundation in Central Chennai, starting at Ramapuram and ending at Saidapet. That's what seems to have happened on Dec 2nd/3rd. This is not even considering Black Swan events like a huge cyclone going right through Chennai as in 1918, or heavier future NE monsoon events driven by climate change and El Nino.

 

[linuxguru]

Just a minor update that an Acer PC with rotating HDD (not SSD) that had been fully submerged underwater for ~24+ hours survived the submersion with just minor problems and booted up fine when powered up today. I just had to manually rotate the processor fan a little to free it, remove and clean the DIMM contacts and reseat the DIMM, and set the CMOS date and time. Everything else just worked (CMOS battery needs to be replaced, no surprise). The LCD monitor also works but the screen has numerous purple splotches due to the water ingress (which may be permanent). The DVD-R/W drive is probably dead, but that's a relatively minor expense.

It probably helped that I pulled the PC out of the water as early as possible on the 3rd afternoon, cleaned the external mud and sludge off, and left it to dry on the terrace immediately. I also allowed it to continue drying for 3 weeks before powering it up today - it booted into windoze after a CMOS error message. For reference, it's a Core 2 Duo E5700 (Wolfdale) in a G31T-M5 v1.0 board - nothing particularly recent.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

I was in Ramapuram on 1st and 2nd Dec. There was 15 feet water on the road (I stay at one of the highest points in Ramapuram). My house (rented, 3 feet above road level) was on the ground floor. Everything got submerged.

Sorry for your horrible experience. Yes, it takes a long time, fighting the damp, killing the mould (spray vinegar) etc. It is a long and boring process that may never end

Just a minor update that an Acer PC with rotating HDD (not SSD) that had been fully submerged underwater for ~24+ hours survived the submersion with just minor problems and booted up fine when powered up today.

Well done!

 

[linuxguru]

Sorry for your horrible experience. Yes, it takes a long time, fighting the damp, killing the mould (spray vinegar) etc. It is a long and boring process that may never end.

Thanks for the tip on vinegar.

Just heard an anecdotal story yesterday, from an acquaintance living at Kilpauk Gardens (also flooded, but to lower levels in the ground floor), about an elderly lady in an apartment complex there. She escaped the flooding by going upstairs, and her apartment was scrubbed and cleaned before she returned there, but she still contracted a respiratory ailment and succumbed after a week or so. There's another similar case of an elderly lady (Mrs. Abraham) here in Defence Colony with a pre-existing respiratory condition who passed away a few days ago.

The damp and mould contributing to the reactivation of the respiratory ailment cannot be ruled out (in fact, it's highly likely). It's physically impossible to scrub every nook and cranny of all traces of flooding. There's a fine brown alluvial silt that's very fertile thanks to all the organic nutrients in the Adyar riverbed (I'll skip the details), on which a green moss/mould grows even when there's very little moisture left, on any surface. I have been scrubbing it out with fresh water and a toothbrush, and leaving articles to dry in sunlight, but sunlight is not an option for interior surfaces like wooden cupboards, or even the insides of everyday articles. Mould also grows easily on interior layers of plywood that has split open.

In short, be exceedingly cautious about returning to live in affected rooms if you have respiratory or asthmatic issues. All upholstery, drapery, seat cushions, etc., may have to go unless you're willing to expend the time and effort to wash them in bleach and sun-dry them.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Sure. I am very much aware that I must be breathing mould spores in my house still, even though we have most of it under control and have removed the major sources.

Clean-up materials: we got through a lot of Lysol, which we used on almost everything. We washed walls down with Robin Bleach. I am using Clorox hot soak and/or prewash machine cycle on all clothes.

I am also using IPA solution (apparently water needs to be there too for it to kill bacteria) generously. I have not yet attempted to recover anything electronic, but anythinf simple-electrical, if worth the time, is getting a wash with the solution and a rinse with pure IPA, my theory being that that will help to draw the water off and dry it. Comments/advice, Linuxguru?

I have some things like vacuum cleaner that I would like to dissasemble and try to dry out the motor. Quite possibly, a lot of that stuff will have simply rusted by the time I get around to it anyway.

We discarded our drinking water pump and bought a new one. That was fun (I might have mentioned it!) with a building guy, no English, and me, no Tamil, talking plumbing (not his trade) to each other quite fluently!

Another pump motor, I took the back off and drained the water. It has now gone to a pump guy for service.

Our Zero-B drinking water purifier was a big casualty. Our independent AMC guy took the hit (I would have paid if asked) and replaced every major part. Most stuff had no power applied (there hadn't been any for over 24 hours) when the water came, but I guess we forgot to unplug the water purifier before power was restored, which was very stupid.

All upholstery, drapery, seat cushions, etc., may have to go unless you're willing to expend the time and effort to wash them in bleach and sun-dry them.

Probably not bleach itself, if you do not want white patches. I've already made that mistake ---and I thought I knew what I was doing! I'm using Clorox and washing at the highest temperature that the fabric will stand. I think that 60C actually kills most stuff. But iif it is really-colour-fast cotton, like several-times-washed sheets, then a 90C "boil wash" is probably a good idea.

Sun is, itself, a disinfectant --- also, of course, it bleaches!

Salvage often depends on whether or not it is worth the trouble. I have a box of multiway extension leads. One important one I have taken apart and cleaned out; others are one-day/sometime/never jobs.

Way back then, I've taken curry stains out of a girlfriend's cream-colour dress by very careful bleaching with frequent checking. Now, do I have the patience to do that to the colour run in my wife's wedding sari? Probably not, and the probable failure would just upset me more. There's a lot of letting-go needed.

On a personal note, a friend I met at a concert, yesterday, told me I was looking better. I think I looked very old and worn, half dead, for the first couple of weeks. I felt it!

 

[linuxguru]

I have not yet attempted to recover anything electronic, but anythinf simple-electrical, if worth the time, is getting a wash with the solution and a rinse with pure IPA, my theory being that that will help to draw the water off and dry it. Comments/advice, Linuxguru?

I have some things like vacuum cleaner that I would like to dissasemble and try to dry out the motor. Quite possibly, a lot of that stuff will have simply rusted by the time I get around to it anyway.

WD-40 can help in resurrecting a lot of stuff with bearings, motors and moving parts, even after they've rusted.

Most electrical or electronic stuff without moving parts can be simply rinsed in water and dried, and mostly seem to work. Some things with caked grime may have to opened, and the grime scrubbed out with a toothbrush and fresh water, before drying. I found that sealed AC adapters for notebooks, routers, cellphones, etc., mostly work after drying - the few that may have died can be replaced inexpensively. DSL/WiFi routers worked, one after opening and scrubbing.

Kettles generally worked after drying. Pumps were serviced locally - mostly a lubrication effort. I did not attempt to clean a regular convection oven as well as a microwave, both of which I gave away to a local bakery (they'll clean and do minor service if needed). The fridge worked after external and internal cleaning, but nothing else. The washing machine worked, but is noisy - probably needs a re-lube. One dryer hasn't been checked yet. The mixie, toaster and microwave were replaced.

The PC worked as mentioned earlier. One LCD TV hasn't been powered on. One induction cooker powers up after cleaning but doesn't accept keypad settings - it's inexpensive at any rate. The keypads on both phones stopped working, but one is still OK to charge the cordless handset. Both have dial tones when plugged in, it's just not possible to dial out from the base unit - no big deal.

Our Zero-B drinking water purifier was a big casualty. Our independent AMC guy took the hit (I would have paid if asked) and replaced every major part. Most stuff had no power applied (there hadn't been any for over 24 hours) when the water came, but I guess we forgot to unplug the water purifier before power was restored, which was very stupid.

The RO water unit has not been repaired yet, but it wasn't submerged - the issue is a clogged pre-filter and some broken external tubing, which we'll get replaced as soon as the company (Aqua Tech near Ashok Nagar) gets around to sending the service guy. Until then, its bubble-top canned water for a few weeks.

One expensive uninsured loss may be a flat-screen TV and one UPS/inverter. The audio amp and players were disconnected and moved upstairs as the water rose. A pair of vintage Bevox speaker particle-board cabinets disintegrated in the water, but all the drivers survived (no big value, anyway). One entertainment centre cabinet disintegrated. One pair of satellite speakers delaminated, but the drivers survived. One ancient 8mm projector and one reel-to-reel deck haven't been tested, but are unlikely to survive. No great loss on either, except that there's no way to transfer audio on reel tapes to other media now. The 8mm home movies are already digitized, but they look really grainy and are likely to bore anybody to death, at any rate - so there was no use for the projector even earlier (it hasn't been operated for a couple of decades, AFAIK).

A few remaining odds-and-ends are left to salvage or replace, including one of those electric tandoor/toaster ovens that's great for making pizza. It's all of Rs.2.5k or so, new. A Panasonic rice cooker is likely to have survived and just needs cleaning.

The house wiring survived without a single short (the junction boxes are near the ceiling for the most part, though there are several outlets within 6" of the floor which we allowed to dry out naturally before connecting anything).

The overall appliance losses haven't been all that great or indispensable or irreplaceable. Much of the stuff that's still needed can simply be replaced by newer or better models. The rest can be safely discarded, like an '80s VHS VCR. The lucky breaks were the PC hard disk surviving, and the repair of the Wagon-R ECU (and starting the engine). The other car will likely be an insured total loss - we didn't attempt salvaging it since there was far too much electronics in it.

 

[cha_indian]

Hi ... I too stay at Ramapuram (On the road which is opposite to DLF...

One thing I have noticed here is that there seem to a lot of closed manufacturing industries. All wells here have brown coloured water...something like tea/rust coloured. Do you know if the ground water was polluted by the industries or this coloured water is just normal/natural here ?

 

[hildebrand]

Hearing about it from my friends in Chennai and seeing in videos, Its been quite sad and horrifying. I hope all Chennai FMs and families will recover from all that they faced soon.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

I bought a couple of new pair of shoes today.

Have been walking around in the same mud-encrusted pair since Dec 2nd, and they were old and scruffy then. All the others got soaked and fell apart. I think I'll nail them to the wall as a memorial!

 

[linuxguru]

One thing I have noticed here is that there seem to a lot of closed manufacturing industries. All wells here have brown coloured water...something like tea/rust coloured. Do you know if the ground water was polluted by the industries or this coloured water is just normal/natural here ?

Manufacturing industries had already been sick and closed over the last 2-3 decades in Chennai. The floods will probably make it much worse, especially for the bulk of the SME sector for which most of the capital assets (machinery, tools, etc.) are uninsured. However, I did notice that there is surprising resilience in many small workshops, and machine tools have been repaired quickly and back to operation in the Guindy Industrial Area and surroundings.

The brown-coloured water is probably due to over-exploitation of ground water and ingress of polluted water with effluents, dissolved iron salts and so on. Other areas in the city like T.Nagar and so on also have it to some extent. You should install an industrial-grade RO water unit that can treat "yellow water" before using this water for domestic use.

BTW, until the early '70s, there was little or no manufacturing or any other source of pollution in the Adyar river upstream of West Saidapet. I have waded in clear river water close to Burma Colony (upstream of the Kasi Theatre causeway, later the bridge) as a kid in 1974, looking at fish and tadpoles. By about 1980, all that was history. Long before that, in the '50s and earlier, British and Anglicized Indians used to hunt on horseback with accompanying hounds in a private forested area called Butt Place, part of which now forms Defence Colony. Somewhat quaint, and I'm glad that the hunting is also history, though I'd have liked the forest to stay (portions of that forest still survive in the OTA training area on both sides of the river upstream of Nandambakkam).

I bought a couple of new pair of shoes today.

I noticed one of my strap-ons drifting away on the road along with other detritus - the other one floated inside the house and was recovered later. Luckily, I did have some spare rubber and plastic slippers, as well as sneakers, etc. that survived. Leather has also not fared too badly after rinsing and drying, may just require waxing with Cherry Blossom.