Bengaluru, December 4, 2015: Heavy rainfall for more than half a month in Chennai has flooded the city, resulting in the disruption of regular life. Chennai citizens have turned to Twitter in this situation of crisis to report and share helpline numbers, crisis relief efforts and safety tips. Popular hashtags that Chennai residents are using for real-time updates are #ChennaiRains,#ChennaiFloods and now #ChennaiRainsHelpas the focus turns to flood rescue and relief efforts, with over 500,000 related Tweets in the past 24 hours.
Residents in Chennai are Tweeting with these three hashtags to help in organised rescue operations, aid government bodies, amplify crucial messages to citizens, warn citizens in key affected areas, and provide a sense of real-time support to citizens caught in the floods. On Twitter, users can find the latest information on flooded areas, forecast updates, train schedules, taxi services, helpline numbers, and crisis relief programmes. Additionally, photos and videos are shared on the platform, providing citizens with a real-time view of what is going on in the streets of Chennai.
Embeddable Tweet:https://twitter.com/TwitterIndia/status/671701461214990336
Embeddable Tweet: https://twitter.com/i/moments/671768642510594052
RaheelKhursheed, Head of News and Government Partnerships, Twitter India said, “The real-time, public nature of Twitter enables the platform to be used in times of crisis for disaster relief and emergency management. For the Chennai floods, we are seeing a great response as citizens are actively reporting on the situation from different parts of the city, and sharing it on Twitter. More than that, residents are crowdsourcing the most useful Tweets that will help fellow Indians with crisis relief tips, safety measures, and forecast updates. It is amazing to see the community unite to provide assistance and save lives, one Tweet at a time.”
Several Twitter accounts to follow for real-time updates on #ChennaiRains :
● @ChennaiConnect (https://twitter.com/ChennaiConnect)
● Chennai Weather (@ChennaiWeather)
● Voice in Crisis Relief (@incrisisrelief)
● Indian Army (@adgpi)
● Sandy (@sandygrains)
● Volunteers Org (@VolunteersOrg)
● MaliniParthasarathy (@MaliniP)
Users can also subscribe to this Twitter list for regular updates on #ChennaiRains : https://twitter.com/TwitterIndia/lists/chennairains
Below are several top flood-related Tweets from Chennai with the highest engagement on Twitter:
Beyond citizen reporting, Twitter users are creating a strong support system to help affected people by providing helpline numbers, food, shelter and crowdsourcing relief efforts via Tweets:
Embeddable Tweet: https://twitter.com/Actor_Vijay/status/671746947041107970
Public figures Tweeting and contributing their voice to raise awareness and support in this time of crisis:
Corporate Comm India(CCI Newswire)
