Cyclone Arnab crosses the Andhra coast, landfall complete

What happened

Landfall began at about 1.30 am on Wednesday, 28 October 2026. IMD’s own update puts the start at about 1.20 am. The centre crossed the Andhra Pradesh and Yanam coasts between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam, south-west of Yanam and about 20 km east-north-east of Narsapur. At about 10.39 am IMD said the landfall process was complete and the system was moving entirely over land, weakened from a very severe to a severe cyclonic storm (ETV Bharat). It has not been called a depression in any report we opened, but the Bhubaneswar centre expects a deep depression over Odisha by Wednesday night.

Cyclone Arnab, rated a very severe cyclonic storm by the India Meteorological Department (IMD), came ashore on the Andhra Pradesh coast in the early hours of Wednesday, 28 October 2026. The landfall began at around 1.30 am near Narsapur in West Godavari district, according to The Hindu. The storm then sat almost still for hours, so the “landfall” went on well into the morning. At 9.38 am IMD placed the centre about 45 km south-south-west of Yanam, with another two hours of landfall still to come. IMD’s reading of the crossing point is between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam, just south of Yanam. Kakinada, Konaseema, West Godavari and Yanam took the strongest wind.

This page is a running record. The numbers will move, and the deaths in particular are not settled. Updated 28 October 2026, 12.30 pm IST. The first version was written on the morning of 28 October 2026.

Wind, rain and the sea

• Wind: IMD gave sustained winds of 125 to 135 km/h with gusts to 150 km/h at the height of it, easing to 115 to 125 km/h with gusts to 140 km/h by the 6.30 am bulletin.
• Rain: the north of the state got the water. Between 8.30 am on 27 October and 4 am on 28 October, IMD recorded over 200 mm at several stations in Anakapalli, Vizianagaram and Visakhapatnam districts. The highest was 261.5 mm at Kannuripalem in Anakapalli.
• Storm surge: IMD first warned of 1.5 to 2.5 m above the normal tide near Kakinada and Yanam. By the morning bulletin it spoke of 1 to 1.5 m. No report we opened gives the height actually seen.
• Other stations: between 8.30 am on 27 October and 5.30 am on 28 October, Visakhapatnam recorded 216.9 mm, Kalingapatnam 147.5 mm, Tuni 123.3 mm, Kakinada 118.4 mm and Machilipatnam 115.2 mm (live blog report of IMD readings). In Odisha, Mahendragiri in Gajapati district recorded 249.9 mm in 24 hours, the highest there, according to the Bhubaneswar centre.

What was done before it arrived

Andhra Pradesh moved people early. By Tuesday evening the Chief Minister said 290 cyclone shelters were open and 84,396 people had been shifted. More than 30,000 fishing boats were brought back from the sea, and 93 Andhra boats were reported safe at Gopalpur in Odisha. 8,400 power staff were kept ready, and the state had planned for as many as 15,000 electric poles to fall. In Uppada, a few thatched houses facing the sea collapsed, and The Hindu reports that the families were safe in the camps.

On the Odisha side, the state said it would move about 48,000 people from low-lying and landslide-prone places, and its minister spoke of about one lakh moved by Wednesday morning. Those two figures differ and we have not been able to reconcile them.

What the storm did

• Trees and poles: at least 200 trees came down inside Visakhapatnam city on Tuesday. The Kakinada police chief said a few hundred trees and fewer than 100 electric poles were uprooted in his district. The Konaseema collector put the number of poles uprooted in that district at about 6,000. These are different districts and different officials, so they are not a contradiction, but they show how uneven the damage was.
• Coast: the Uppada beach road was damaged by waves, and one report says it was washed away. Boats tied to trees at Kakinada were carried into the creek. Five fishing boats capsized at Visakhapatnam.
• Homes and fields: rainwater entered houses in Gajuwaka in Visakhapatnam. Low-lying parts of Visakhapatnam, Konaseema and Yanam were flooded, and houses were damaged in Mummidivaram and Yanam. A banyan tree fell on a house in Yanam. Paddy was flattened at Ramachandrapuram.
• Rescues: police in Kakinada brought out four people trapped by floodwater near Bombay Katta, and a rescue team reached three night-shift staff cut off at the port godowns.
• Travel and power: India Today reports at least 91 trains and 21 flights cancelled across Tuesday and Wednesday. In parts of Visakhapatnam, power was out for nearly 24 hours. After landfall, about 50 trains from Vijayawada were halted with delays of up to five hours, and the Delhi to Bhogapuram flight was cancelled (Deccan Chronicle).

Deaths reported so far

The early statements and the later reports pull in different directions, and all of them are on the record.

• The Hindu, in a report published at 11.31 pm on Tuesday 27 October, says one man, 65, died at Mangalapalem in Visakhapatnam after he allegedly came in contact with live wires that had snapped and fallen into water.
• On Wednesday morning, at about 8.45 am, the Chief Minister said no loss of life had been reported so far, and credited the advance precautions. The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) also reported no casualties at 10.19 am. The Hindu’s own early-morning report found no human loss in Kakinada, Konaseema and West Godavari districts.
• Later on Wednesday, PTI, quoting officials, reported two deaths by electrocution in separate incidents in Andhra Pradesh. A 53-year-old man died on Tuesday night after touching a live wire that had snapped over an agricultural field channel. A woman died on Wednesday morning after stepping on an exposed live wire outside her home in Yellamanchili, Anakapalli district; PTI’s headline gives her age as 55 (ETV Bharat live blog, 11.46 am).

The Chief Minister’s 8.45 am statement came before these reports, so it no longer describes the position. The Hindu’s man is 65 and PTI’s is 53, so we cannot tell whether they are the same person, and we do not add the reports together. At least two people have died of live-wire contact in Andhra Pradesh, and possibly three. No names have been published in the reports we read, and we have not used any. In Odisha, the Times of India reports that a 40-year-old woman died in Puri district on Tuesday around 9 am when a tree fell on her house and a brick wall collapsed on her while she was cooking, in rain and wind linked to the approaching cyclone.

Why a live wire in water is the danger people forget

A cyclone is over when the wind drops, but the next few hours are when many people step outside. Wires snap, poles lean, and the water on the road can carry current. The death reported from Visakhapatnam is exactly that case. If a line is down, stay far from it and from any water around it, and ring the electricity helpline or 112. Do not try to move a wire with a stick or a bamboo. Our step-by-step guide on live wires and floodwater after a cyclone covers what to do when you see one down, and our guide on electric wires near your house, balcony or terrace has the basics, and the cyclone safety guide covers warnings, evacuation and what to do after. Never wade or drive through floodwater, as set out in our guide on floodwater.

A warning about videos

A fact-check published on 29 September 2026 found that an Instagram reel posted on 24 September, which claimed to show “Cyclone Arnab” damage in Odisha, was footage from Bhadradri Kothagudem in Telangana. The name Arnab was in the news for weeks before this landfall, so old and borrowed clips will be going around. Before you forward a cyclone video, check the date and the place.

Living on the Kakinada coast? Our Kakinada fire and emergency safety guide lists the district fire stations and emergency numbers, and the cyclone and sea-water risks worth planning for.

After landfall

An IMD scientist said the system would move north and north-east, bringing rain to Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, eastern Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh before it weakens over land. The Regional Meteorological Centre in Bhubaneswar expects it to become a deep depression and cross Odisha’s Malkangiri district by Wednesday night.

• Odisha: a red warning for heavy to very heavy rain, with isolated extremely heavy falls, covers Ganjam, Gajapati, Rayagada, Koraput, Malkangiri and Nabarangpur. Winds of 60 to 70 km/h, gusting to 80 or 85 km/h, are expected in some districts, and fishermen are told to stay out of the sea until 29 October. The state minister said about one lakh people had been moved by 7.28 am, and 2,037 shelters were ready.
• Jharkhand: schools are closed in several districts until 29 October, and IMD has issued heavy rain warnings for nine districts, including Ranchi.
• Andhra Pradesh: streams overflowed in Srikakulam, the bus stand was flooded and road links to hundreds of villages were cut (Deccan Chronicle); flood alerts went out for 167 villages and paddy fields went under water (PTI). A railway track was damaged and the ghat road closed in Alluri Sitharama Raju district, and the Araku tourist spots are shut for three days. Crop damage runs to thousands of acres, with the full extent awaiting an official assessment. At about 12.05 pm the Chief Minister reviewed the districts, asked for fallen trees on highways and other roads to be cleared, and wrote to the Union Home Minister with a preliminary damage assessment.

What is not known

The final number of dead and injured, which of the live-wire reports overlap, the exact landfall point and the time it ended, the damage to houses, crops and power lines, the surge height actually reached, and the date the storm is downgraded to a depression. We have not seen final figures from Odisha, Chhattisgarh or Jharkhand. Last checked on 28 October 2026 at 12.30 pm IST.