Update — Sunday, September 27

The Irrigation Department has extended the flood warnings on both river basins for a further 24 hours, NewsFirst reported on Sunday morning, with Hiru News carrying the same extension. The warnings have now been running for four days.

Minor flood levels are still being recorded at three named points:

RiverLocation
Gin RiverBaddegama
Nilwala RiverThalgahagoda
Kuda Ganga (a Kalu River tributary)Millakanda

Hiru added a warning for motorists travelling through the affected areas, particularly on minor roads, alongside the standing advice to residents of low-lying ground.

Red evacuation warnings have widened in Kandy

The red landslide evacuation warnings now cover four divisional secretariat divisions in Kandy — Udapalatha, Pasbage Korale, Doluwa and Ganga Ihala Korale — and four in Nuwara Eliya — Kotmale East, Kotmale West, Ambagamuwa and Nuwara Eliya.

That is a wider footprint than on Wednesday, when Kandy’s red warning covered Pasbage Korale alone. Udapalatha, Doluwa and Ganga Ihala Korale have been added since. In Nuwara Eliya the Nuwara Eliya division now appears in place of Norwood.

The National Building Research Organisation says Level One and Level Two landslide warnings remain in force for divisions in the Galle, Kandy, Kegalle, Nuwara Eliya, Ratnapura and Colombo districts.

The forecast

The Meteorology Department expects several spells of rain in the Western and Sabaragamuwa provinces and the Galle, Matara, Kandy and Nuwara Eliya districts. Showers or thundershowers may occur after 2 p.m. in the Uva and Eastern provinces and in the Polonnaruwa, Mullaitivu and Hambantota districts.

Original report — Wednesday, September 24

The Department of Irrigation has issued minor flood warnings for low-lying areas along both the Nilwala and Gin rivers, covering 12 divisional secretariat divisions over the next 24 hours after heavy rainfall pushed water levels up.

Nilwala basin

Residents in low-lying areas along the Nilwala in the Pasgoda, Kotapola, Pitabeddara, Akuressa, Athuraliya, Malimbada, Kamburupitiya and Tihagoda divisional secretariat divisions have been urged to remain highly vigilant, Hiru News reported.

Gin basin

A separate warning covers the Tawalama, Nagoda, Baddegama and Welivitiya-Divithura divisions along the Gin River, where the department has asked residents to stay vigilant.

The weather behind it

The Meteorology Department said on Tuesday evening that the deep depression over the west-central and adjoining northwest Bay of Bengal was likely to move west-northwestwards and cross the coastal areas of northern Andhra Pradesh and southern Odisha in India overnight, the Daily Mirror reported.

The system will not strike Sri Lanka directly, the department said, but rainy conditions in the island’s southwest are expected to continue because of the wind flow running toward it.

Showers or thundershowers were forecast at times in the Western, Sabaragamuwa, Central and North-western provinces and in the Galle and Matara districts, with falls above 100 mm likely in places — the catchments feeding both rivers now under warning. Strong winds of 40-50 kmph were expected at times over the western slopes of the central hills, the North-central and North-western provinces and in Trincomalee, Hambantota and Matale.

In a Thursday morning bulletin the department listed the Southern Province alongside the Western, Sabaragamuwa, Central and North-western provinces in the showers forecast, and added that a few showers may also fall in the North-central Province and the Mannar district, Hiru News reported.

Red landslide warnings in the hills

The same rainfall has brought red landslide warnings for the Pasbage Korale division in the Kandy district and for Ambagamuwa, Kotmale East, Kotmale West and Norwood in the Nuwara Eliya district, with Level Two warnings covering several further divisions, NewsFirst reported. Those divisions sit over the catchments where the Maussakele and Castlereagh reservoirs are closing on spill level.

The warnings follow a run of wet-zone flood alerts this month, including school closures in the Kuda Ganga basin and red landslide warnings across six districts.

Not reported

No outlet gives the recorded gauge readings behind the warnings, names the gauging stations, or says whether any evacuations or road closures have followed.

The two outlets also differ on the extent of the Nilwala warning. Hiru names eight divisional secretariat divisions; NewsFirst names six, omitting Kotapola and Akuressa. The Gin list is identical in both. Residents in the two divisions named only by Hiru should treat themselves as covered rather than excluded.

Sources