Severe Cyclonic Storm Murasu will make landfall near Ongole in Prakasam district, Andhra Pradesh, and the India Meteorological Department says the process will commence before 3 a.m. on Tuesday, November 3, 2026. The warning came in a bulletin the IMD issued at 1 a.m., and the clock is now the most important number for millions of people along the southern coast.

The storm is centred over the West Central Bay of Bengal, off the South Andhra Pradesh coast. It is moving northwest at 10 kmph and is expected to keep that pace. As of 11.30 p.m. on Monday, November 2, the system was roughly 50 km from Kavali, 60 km off southeast of Ongole, 90 km northeast of Nellore and 150 km southwest of Machilipatnam. Those distances are shrinking with every bulletin.

The wind is already arriving. The IMD reported gales of 70-90 kmph, gusting to 100 kmph, along and off the Andhra Pradesh coast. That is strong enough to bring down branches, damage weak roofs and make open coastal stretches dangerous, and it is happening before the core of the storm has reached land.

The outer spiral band in the northern sector has already moved into southern coastal Andhra Pradesh. Behind it, the wall cloud region in the forward sector is approaching the shoreline. Forecasters are watching that wall cloud closely, because it is the part of the system that tends to deliver the most intense conditions when it reaches the coast.

The rain warning is the part that could catch people off guard

The rain has been slow to arrive, and that is exactly what makes it dangerous. Between 8.30 a.m. and 10.30 p.m. on Monday, none of the districts likely to be affected recorded any rainfall, according to real-time data from the Directorate of Economics and Statistics. Experts now expect rainfall activity to pick up at night, and they have sounded a word of caution to both the public and officials.

The Andhra Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority, known as APSDMA, has warned of extremely heavy rainfall on the intervening night of November 2-3 in parts of Ongole Rural, Kothapatnam and Chinaganjam mandals of Prakasam district. That is the highest level of warning in the bulletin, and it covers the zone where the storm is expected to make landfall.

Very heavy rainfall is also expected across a long list of mandals. These include Ongole Urban, Naguluppalapadu, Vetapalem, Tangutur, Singarayakonda, Ulavapadu, Maddipadu, Gudluru, Zarugumilli, Santhanuthalapadu and Kandukur. For families in these areas, the difference between a manageable night and a dangerous one may come down to how early they move valuables, check drains and avoid low-lying roads.

Why this matters for Andhra Pradesh

This is a direct hit on Andhra Pradesh’s coastline, not a distant weather story. Prakasam district sits in the path of the landfall, and the warnings cover multiple mandals, from the urban core of Ongole to rural and coastal areas further out. Nellore and Kavali are also close enough to the storm track to be in the discussion, which means the impact is spread across more than one district in the state.

Every mandal named in the warning is a place where people will be making decisions in the dark, with power and communication at risk and rain expected to build through the night. The authorities have not yet described the full scale of damage, so the most useful information right now is the timing, the wind speeds and the rain zones that have already been named.

The one number residents should save

For anyone in Prakasam or any other affected district who needs help, assistance is available through Mana Mitra at 9552300009. The number is listed for reporting problems or emergencies at any time, which matters when roads flood, trees fall or someone needs medical support in the middle of the night.

Save it now, before the rain picks up. If the storm moves faster or the rain arrives earlier than the forecast suggests, the window to make calls and move to safer ground will shrink quickly.

Experts say the rainfall activity is likely to pick up at night and sounded a word of caution to the public and officials.

What happens next

The storm is moving slowly, at 10 kmph, which means its impact will stretch across many hours rather than passing in a single burst. That slow pace is what keeps the countdown tense. A system that crawls toward the coast gives people less rest, more uncertainty and a longer period of wind and rain before it fully clears.

The next bulletins from the India Meteorological Department and APSDMA will decide how the night unfolds for the coastal districts. Every update will reset the timeline, the distance to landfall and the risk level for each mandal. Readers following this story should watch for changes in the distance figures and any upgrade to the rain warnings for the listed areas.

For now, the facts are clear. Severe Cyclonic Storm Murasu is close to the Andhra Pradesh coast, the landfall near Ongole is due before 3 a.m., winds are already gusting to 100 kmph, and extremely heavy rain has been forecast for parts of Prakasam district. The time to prepare is measured in hours, not days.