The Indian military struggled to evacuate thousands of residents stranded in the southern state of Tamil Nadu on Thursday as the death toll from flooding rose to 269 after the heaviest cloudburst in over a century, Reuters reported. Predictions of incessant rainfall by the weather office meant that the army had to work on a war footing to rescue survivors trapped in inundated parts of Chennai, India's fourth most populous city. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has blamed climate change for the deluge, travelled to Chennai to get a first-hand view of a rescue effort that has so far been halting. "Chennai has become a small island. This is unprecedented," Home Minister Rajnath Singh told parliament. "Rapid rescue and relief is the need of the hour. We are working very hard to restore normality." After auto manufacturers and IT outsourcing firms suspended operations on Wednesday, state-run Chennai Petroleum shut down its 210,000 barrels per day oil refinery due to the heavy flooding. There was sporadic rainfall on Thursday, after a 24-hour cloudburst dumped as much as 345 mm (14 inches) of rain on the city earlier this week.
