AS early as on November 14, fully five days before the devastating cyclone hit the Andhra coast, it was reported that the cyclone was expected to be "much more severe" than the one that had hit the Nagapattinam coast in southern Tamil Nadu two days earlier; and fully 48 hours before, on November' 17, the army sub-area commander at Secunderabad was asked by the army authorities to get in touch with the Andhra Pradesh government ''to render all possible assistance should the cyclone hit the Masulipatnam coast". Nevertheless, when the cyclone did hit the Andhra coast, the local administration was utterly unprepared to meet the crisis. The result has been extremely heavy loss of life