The National Building Research Organisation has issued landslide warnings for nine districts covering the next 24 hours, and the Department of Meteorology expects more than 100mm of rain again on Friday — even though the low-pressure system that drove this week’s flooding has moved off the island.
The warnings cover Badulla, Kandy, Nuwara Eliya, Kegalle, Ratnapura, Colombo, Kalutara, Kurunegala and Monaragala, Hiru News reported at 5.21 p.m. The NBRO asked people in the affected areas to remain alert.
That is close to double the scope of the advisory this desk reported on 20 October, which covered five districts. Colombo and Kalutara — the two most densely populated districts on the list — are new to it.
Rain is forecast to continue into Friday
The Met Department said that although the low-pressure area has moved away from the island, heavy falls above 100mm remain possible on Friday at some places in the Western, Sabaragamuwa, Central, Northern and North Western provinces and in the Anuradhapura and Galle districts, Hiru reported at 4.43 p.m. Falls above 75mm are possible elsewhere.
Earlier in the day, the department’s Director of Forecasting Meril Mendis said the low was then sitting to the island’s north-west and moving westward only gradually, so its effects would persist through Thursday and into Friday morning, NewsFirst reported at 10.25 a.m. The heaviest falls of the preceding 24 hours were in the Central Highlands and the North Western and Northern provinces.
The filings do not agree on where the system is
These accounts are not easily reconciled, and this desk is not resolving them.
The morning filing places the low to the island’s north-west and moving west. The evening filing says it has moved away from the island. A third advisory, issued at 5.39 p.m., cites the risk from a low-pressure area in the Bay of Bengal — which lies to the island’s north and east, the opposite side from the morning position.
Whether that is one system described loosely at different points, or more than one, is not stated in any of the filings. What they agree on is that heavy rain is expected to continue.
Fishing suspended over a wide sea area
The Met Department advised fishing and naval communities to refrain from going to sea between latitudes 10°N and 20°N and longitudes 80°E and 95°E until further notice, Hiru reported.
Craft already in those waters were told to move to a safe area.
That box spans roughly 1,100km north to south and covers most of the Bay of Bengal. It sits north of Sri Lanka’s own coastal waters, so the restriction falls on deep-sea vessels rather than inshore boats.
A slope is already on the line at Kadigamuwa
The warnings are not purely anticipatory. Earth from the slope beside Kadigamuwa railway station washed onto the track again on Thursday, disrupting services on the upcountry line, Hiru reported at 6.12 p.m. The Railway Department said several upcountry trains were running late.
Hiru’s wording — that the slope washed down “again today” — makes this a recurrence rather than a first slip, though the filing does not say when the earlier falls happened or whether the slope has been stabilised since.
Kadigamuwa is in the Kegalle district, one of the nine under the NBRO’s 24-hour warning, and the upcountry line runs through Kegalle, Kandy and Nuwara Eliya — three more districts on the same list. The filing gives no train numbers, no length of delay and no estimate of when the line will be clear.
Update, Friday 23 October: extended to 10 districts — but the list has rotated, not simply widened
The NBRO has extended its landslide early warnings for several divisional secretariat divisions, and the count has risen from nine districts to 10, Hiru News reported at 6.09 p.m. on Friday, citing the prevailing adverse weather and heavy rainfall.
The new list is Kegalle, Ratnapura, Kandy, Nuwara Eliya, Matale, Kalutara, Gampaha, Matara, Hambantota and Kurunegala.
A net increase of one district understates what changed. Set against Thursday’s nine, seven of the districts on the two lists differ:
| Districts | |
|---|---|
| Still under warning (6) | Kandy, Nuwara Eliya, Kegalle, Ratnapura, Kalutara, Kurunegala |
| Newly added (4) | Matale, Gampaha, Matara, Hambantota |
| Dropped (3) | Badulla, Colombo, Monaragala |
The direction of that change is the story. The warning has moved south and west: Matara and Hambantota bring the deep south under a landslide warning for the first time this week, Gampaha extends it north of the capital, and Matale adds a fourth central district. At the same time the NBRO has lifted the warning from the two Uva province districts — Badulla and Monaragala — on the island’s eastern flank, and from Colombo.
Colombo’s removal is worth stating plainly, because this article noted on Thursday that Colombo and Kalutara, the two most densely populated districts on the list, were new to it. Kalutara remains; Colombo does not. Residents of Gampaha, Matara and Hambantota are the ones who should now read the warning as covering them.
This pattern is consistent with the weather driving it. The departing low-pressure area has been tracking west and away from the island, while the heaviest rainfall bands have shifted down the western and southern coasts — which matches a warning footprint rotating out of the east and into the south.
Not reported
None of the filings gives the NBRO warning levels by district — the organisation normally issues graded alerts, and the level determines whether residents are told to watch, prepare or evacuate. Nor does Friday’s extension name the specific divisional secretariat divisions inside each of the 10 districts, which is the level at which the warning actually applies. No filing gives an evacuation count, a casualty figure or the number of households affected, or says for how long the extension runs.
No filing states when the fishing advisory is expected to be lifted. The expected track of the Bay of Bengal system has since been published, and is covered separately in this desk’s report on the cyclone forecast: the Met Department expects it to reach cyclonic-storm strength over the west-central Bay of Bengal by the morning of 26 October, away from Sri Lanka.
