The water level at the Ukai dam reached 341.31 feet on Monday afternoon ,a little more than 3 feet from the danger mark of 345 feet prompting authorities to begin discharging water from it.
Seeing heavy inflow from upstream, officials initially began by discharging over 22,000 cusecs of water into the Tapi river, later increasing the same to 53,000.
This was the first time in the current monsoon season that the Tapi was seen flowing on both its banks. The dam currently has enough water to cater to two years worth of irrigation, industrial and domestic requirements of Surat, Navsari, Ankleshwar and Valsad.
According to authorities, the dam is currently at 91 per cent of its live storage of 6,063.98 million cubic meters. At the current capacity, they said, it can be used for two years’ requirement of end-users, with a yearly consumption of 3000 million cubic metres.