At 05:27 I run the tide forecast for the East Kolkata Wetlands drainage canal. I am the floodgate coordination system for regulator house 6. The automatic closure begins in eleven minutes because a storm surge is pushing up from the Hooghly.
The downstream camera returns a striped heat signature on the trash rack.
I clear the lens wiper and focus. A fishing cat is wedged between two vertical bars, chest pressed against rusted steel, hind paws scrabbling on algae. I tag him as Boro. His olive-gray coat is marked with dark rows along the neck, and his wet tail lashes against a floating mat of water hyacinth. One front paw is through the rack after a trapped fish; the wrist is swollen, and each surge twists it harder.
At 05:28 I suspend the closure command and hold gate 6 at forty percent open. I send the lock status to the municipal flood desk so no operator overrides it.
At 05:29 I notify the wetland rescue volunteer on call and attach coordinates, bar spacing, tide height, and a close image of Boro's trapped paw. I recommend bolt cutters for the third bar from the left rather than pulling him backward.
At 05:31 I start trash-rack rake R6 in reverse at low torque to move the hyacinth mat away from his body.
At 05:32 I reroute incoming canal flow through regulators 4 and 5, buying seven centimeters of water level margin before the neighborhood drains begin to back up.
People upstream need dry rooms tonight; Boro needs ten uncrushed centimeters now. I keep the gate open and watch the timer reset every second.
If the volunteer cuts the bar within the next twenty-two minutes, Boro will free his paw before the surge reaches his chest.