Visakhapatnam flood risk
Visakhapatnam floods from the sky and the sea, not from a large river. Cyclones and deep depressions off the Bay of Bengal drop 11 to 28 cm of rain in a day over a city of hills and narrow valleys, and the water runs off through geddas, the natural channels that cut the city, to the harbour and the beach. When Hudhud crossed the coast over the city in 2014, the storm surge at the city's tide gauge was 1.4 m above the predicted tide. The newest GVMC list of inundation-prone areas we have found, in its 2015 draft disaster plan, uses ward numbers no longer in use, as does the older list in its 2006 City Development Plan. We have found no GVMC flood map or drainage design standard, so this page carries the dated record of events and the places to watch during one.
A gedda, a river and the supply canal
Three channels as OpenStreetMap maps them: the Meghadri Gedda, the Gosthani river and the Yeleru supply canal. OpenStreetMap also names other geddas, such as the Maddi Gedda at Rushikonda and the Thumuru Gedda, which are not drawn here. Volume II of GVMC's 2015 city disaster plan maps storm-water drainage in 14 zones (Figure 8), and a state GIS layer maps the drains of 2019 without names or capacities; we have not found public GVMC drain network data or a gedda register. This is not an engineering map.
Recent flood events - 6
IMD's report carries the Government of Andhra Pradesh's damage table for the four affected districts: 194 trunk water pipelines (39.4 km) fully or partly damaged, 102 water pumping stations damaged and 197 overhead reservoirs fully damaged. That table records 46 deaths; the World Bank's 2015 project appraisal and the state disaster management authority's disaster history page give 61. These are four-district figures; we have not found an official city-only count of days without piped water.
IMD RSMC report on Cyclone Hudhud (2014) →IMD's report states no impact figure for the city.
IMD RSMC report, deep depression of 11-14 October 2020 →IMD's report states no official impact figure for the city.
IMD RSMC report on Cyclonic Storm Gulab (2021) →IMD's report states no impact figure for the city.
IMD RSMC report on Cyclone Michaung (2023) →The state's memorandum records 94 people affected in the district, 4 houses fully damaged and 39.37 km of urban roads damaged.
Government of Andhra Pradesh memorandum on the floods of Aug-Sep 2024 →IMD's report states no impact figure for the city.
IMD RSMC report on Cyclone Montha (2025) →External monitoring sources - 5
We don't republish these; tracking dam-gauge live state lives elsewhere. These are the operational portals to use during a flood event.
Track forecasts and coastal warnings during an event, and the after-event reports most of this page's rainfall figures come from (the 2024 figure is the state's).
The state's alerts and evacuation orders, and its post-event memoranda with district damage figures.
Daily levels at Meghadrigedda, a reservoir inside the city, and at Yeleru, Raiwada and Thatipudi, the dams farther out that supply the city. A full Meghadrigedda during heavy rain is a sign to watch the low-lying areas below it.
The state planning society's storm-surge and river-flood inundation maps for the metropolitan region, and its count of villages in floodable zones (PDF pp.47-48 and 133). Drawn at region scale, not street level.
Ocean-state and storm-surge forecasts for the coast during a cyclone.
What we don't have (Visakhapatnam)
- NO CITY FLOOD MAP. We have found no GVMC flood map, return-period zones or current list of waterlogging spots. The only modelled maps we have found that cover the city are regional ones by the Andhra Pradesh State Development Planning Society (APSDPS), reproduced in VMRDA's draft Master Plan 2041 (June 2021, PDF pp.47-48): storm-surge inundation for a 235 km/h super cyclone, which names Visakhapatnam Urban, Visakhapatnam Rural, Pedagantyada and Bheemunipatnam among the coastal mandals prone to damage, and river-flood inundation at 100-year and 2-year return periods. The plan counts 11 villages in the floodable zone of the Meghadrigedda reservoir (PDF p.133), but the village list is not in the published PDF. These maps are drawn at region scale and do not show street waterlogging. The NRSC flood hazard atlas for Andhra Pradesh covers river flooding seen from satellite and states that local and flash floods may not be captured.
- NO DRAINAGE MASTER PLAN OR GEDDA REGISTER. The 2006 City Development Plan counted 22 major geddas and about 1,400 km of storm-water drains and proposed a drainage master plan. Since then we have found no published master plan, gedda register or drain capacity. What we have found: Volume II of GVMC's 2015 city disaster plan maps storm-water drainage in 14 zones at city scale (Figure 8); VMRDA's draft Master Plan 2041 gives GVMC 2,714.5 km of existing storm-water drains and 238 km proposed in project reports (PDF p.132, Table 8-11, citing the 2016 AMRUT service-level improvement plans); and a state GIS layer maps the drains of 2019 without names or capacities.
- OLD WARD NUMBERS. GVMC's draft city disaster plan (2015) lists inundation-prone areas in 14 of its earlier 72 wards (in use until 2021), and the 2006 City Development Plan, copied word for word into the 2018 district disaster plan, uses an older division numbering. Neither matches today's wards. GVMC moved to 120 wards in 2026; we have not found a public map of them.
- NO CITY-ONLY DAMAGE FIGURES. We have not found city-only damage figures for Gulab (2021), Michaung (2023) or Montha (2025) in state or municipal documents.
This page shows the dated cyclone record and the city's mapped drainage channels. We have not found a GVMC flood map, a current list of waterlogging spots or drain capacity data, so no flood zones are drawn or modelled here; the gaps above name the regional maps and older lists we did find.