Chennai received 34.5cm rain in the past 24 hours. Met officials said the state hasn’t been lashed by such a downpour in 100 years. Looking at all these factors, one can’t help but wonder why Faceebook put off the activation of the Safety Check feature for so long.

Facebook’s Safety Check tool allows people to mark themselves as “safe” during the ongoing floods. The website sends users in the affected area a note asking them if they’re safe. And when a user clicks “Yes, let my friends know,” the tool automatically notifies all Facebook friends. If a user is in the affected area, they can let their friends know and reach out for help.

The Safety Check tool is “an easy and simple way to say you’re safe and check on all your friends and family in one place”, said Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in an update on the networking site .

“ When disasters happen, people need to know their loved ones are safe. It’s moments like this that being able to connect really matters ,” he had said .

To mark someone else safe during a disaster: 1. Go to the Safety Check page.

2. On the Safety Check page, search for a friend using their name or information on their profile. Please keep in mind that you can only mark people safe if they’re your friends.

3. Click Mark Safe next to the person’s name. You can also click Comment below their name to send them your thoughts or concerns.

The response on Twitter was mostly an acknowledgement of it being informative:

… But, people had been waiting for the feature to be activated:

The feature, which debuted in October 2014, has now been deployed on several occasions. The most recent, and somewhat controversial one, being last month’s terrorist attacks in Paris.

ScoopWhoop has contacted Facebook questioning why the feature was activated so late in the drowning city. We are still waiting for a response.