PARLIAMENT | Putrajaya has denied that the Meteorological Department issued a late warning for heavy rainfall in Penang.

Deputy Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Abu Bakar Mohamad said two warnings were issued on Nov 1 and Nov 4 respectively, by the department, on television.

"We issued an early warning on Nov 1, that our monitoring (system) showed heavy rainfall was expected in one or two days," he told Dewan Rakyat during a question-and-answer session today.

The subsequent alert, an orange warning came at 6 pm on Nov  4, to warn that the state would expect continuing rainfall, he added. 

Abu Bakar was responding to Tan Kok Wai (DAP-Cheras) who questioned if the Meteorology Department had failed in its work by only alerting Penangites hours before the incident.

"Has the department failed in issuing an early alert? Isn't that negligence or weakness due to the lack of efficient and backdated equipment?" asked the acting DAP chairperson.

Abu Bakar shot back,"You did not watch television, this has been informed via television...we have good equipment."

"If you don't know, just don't talk nonsense," he said.

The department was previously criticised by the Penang Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) for only issuing a warning on its website at 9:30pm on Saturday, hours after flooding began that morning.

Yellow notices signal weather conditions that do not pose an immediate threat, while amber notices mean people in affected areas should prepare for the anticipated conditions. Red notices denote severe weather conditions that require people to move out of danger zones.

A check by Malaysiakini found this post from Nov 1 on the department’s Facebook page, but no tweets on the matter.

Penang is experiencing its heaviest recorded rainfall in its history. At least seven perished and 3,779 people were evacuated after many areas in the state were inundated.

Strong winds lashed across the island and mainland, uprooting trees, damaging roads and buildings, and stranding vehicles, causing massive traffic jams.

Flights and bus routes were interrupted, and some areas in Jelutong suffered blackouts.

Several housing projects, including Bolton Surin in Chee Sent Garden, Tanjung Bungah, saw its road and housing units collapse due to the strong winds.

Besides Penang, parts of Kedah and Perak have also been affected.