BHUBANESHWAR, India — A massive, powerful cyclone was hammering India's eastern coastline with heavy rains and destructive winds Saturday, as hundreds of thousands of people living in the region moved inland and took shelter, hoping to ride out the dangerous storm.

Roads were all but empty as high waves lashed the coastline of Orissa state, which will bear the brunt of Cyclone Phailin. By midafternoon, wind gusts were so strong that they could blow over grown men. Along the coast, seawater was pushing inland, swamping villages where many people survive as subsistence farmers in mud and thatch huts.

As the cyclone swept across the Bay of Bengal toward the Indian coast, satellite images showed its spinning tails covering an area larger than France.

Officials said early reports of deaths from Phailin won't become clear until after daybreak Sunday.

In Behrampur, a town about 7 miles inland from where the eye of the storm was expected to hit, the sky blackened quickly around the time of landfall, with heavy winds and rains pelting the empty streets.

A few hours before it hit land, the eye of the storm collapsed, spreading the hurricane force winds out over a larger area and giving it a "bigger damage footprint," said Jeff Masters, meteorology director at the U.S.-based private Weather Underground.
By Friday evening, some 420,000 people had been moved to higher ground or shelters in Orissa, and 100,000 more in neighboring Andhra Pradesh, said Indian Home Secretary Anil Goswami.
A storm surge — the giant wall of water that that a cyclone blasts ashore — of 20 feet or more is feared.

"Phailin may have 'weakened' prior to landfall, however its storm surge was already generated when it was a Category 5 equivalent tropical cyclone," said Jonathan Erdman, senior meteorologist at weather.com.

A storm surge is the big killer in such storms, though heavy rains are likely to compound the destruction. The Indian government said some 12 million people would be affected by the storm, including millions living far from the coast.

A swath of 8 to 16 inches of rain likely to trigger life-threatening flash flooding, as well, as Phailin moves inland.

In Andhra Pradesh, the government evacuated at least 64,000 people from low-lying areas, said state Revenue Minister N. Raghuveera Reddy.

The sea had already pushed inland as much as 130 feet in parts of the state.

The storm is expected to cause large-scale power and communications outages and shut down road and rail links, officials said. It's also expected to cause extensive damage to crops.

http://www.weather.com/news/weather-hurricanes/cyclone-phailin-20131011