Dhaka, May 21 (PTI) Cyclone 'Amphan' which battered West Bengal has also wreaked havoc in Bangladesh, killing at least 10 people, devastating coastal villages, inundating many areas and damaging scores of houses, officials said on Thursday.

Cyclone 'Amphan', the strongest to hit the region in nearly two decades, made landfall on Wednesday evening. It was the most powerful storm since cyclone 'Sidr' killed nearly 3,500 people in 2007.

“The cyclone claimed 10 lives,” state minister for disaster management Enamur Rahman told a media briefing.

Initial reports from the coastlines suggested most of the deaths were caused by accidents like trees falling on people and wall collapse. A Red Crescent volunteer drowned during an evacuation bid.

According to initial government estimates, the cyclone caused Tk 11 billion (USD 129 million) in damage to housing, infrastructure, fisheries and livestock, water resources and agriculture in Bangladesh, Rahman said.

Energy ministry officials said around 20 million electricity connections, out of total 36.4 million across the country, were severed as the cyclone hit.

The body of Cyclone Preparedness Programme (CPP) leader Shah Alam was recovered nine hours after he went missing following the capsizing of a boat in a canal in Kalapara upazila, Kalapara Upazila Nirbahi Officer Abu Hasnat said.

A boat carrying CPP volunteers, including Alam, sank in the Hafez Pedar canal on Wednesday morning after being hit by the storm, a report said.

Many low-lying areas were inundated, embankments collapsed, trees uprooted and houses damaged by the cyclone in the coastal districts of Bangladesh, the Dhaka Tribune reported.

Cyclone Amphan has turned into a land depression, bdnews24.com reported.

The cyclone is likely to move further in a north-northeasterly direction and weaken gradually, the Bangladesh Meteorological Department was quoted as saying by the report.

At least seven persons were killed in the Barguna, Satkhira, Pirojpur, Bhola and Patuakhali districts, the Dhaka Tribune reported.

In Barguna, a 60-year-old man died by drowning, in Satkhira, a 40-year-old woman died after being hit by a falling tree branch, in Pirojpur a 60-year-old man died after a wall collapsed on him, authorities were quoted as saying by the report.

In Bhola, two persons were killed during the stormy weather caused by the cyclonic storm. In Patuakhali, a six-year-old boy died after being hit by a falling tree branch.

In Jessore district, a 45-year-old woman and her 13-year-old daughter died after a tree fell on their house.

The cyclone brought with it heavy downpour as predicted while most parts of Khulna region were severely battered by tidal surges and very heavy showers, they said.

On Wednesday, the cyclone made landfall at 2.30 p.m. between Digha in West Bengal and Hatiya island in Bangladesh, flattening fragile dwellings, uprooting trees and electric poles.

The cyclone 'Amphan' started crossing the Bangladesh coast around 5 pm on Wednesday packing a wind speed of around 160 to 180kph rising to 200kph within 80km of its centre, meteorologist Abdul Mannan said.

Officials believe that the world's largest mangrove forest, shared both by India and Bangladesh, Sundarbans absorbed the major impact of the killer storm.

Bangladesh shifted over 20 lakh people to storm shelters and deployed the military to deal with the powerful cyclone.

Leading global storm tracker AccuWeather on Tuesday described Amphan as the first super cyclone in the Bay of Bengal since 1999.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)