Keep umbrellas by your side as heavy rain will continue to batter Mumbai till Monday

The southwest monsoon arrived in Mumbai and its surrounding areas on Saturday morning, a day sooner than what India meteorological department (IMD) had expected. The IMD has predicted that heavy rain will continue till Monday.

Between 8.30am and 11.30pm on Saturday, Colaba, representative of south Mumbai, recorded 160.8mm of rainfall, one of the highest June figures in the area. Between 5.30pm and 8.30pm, Colaba recorded received 108mm of rainfall. Santacruz, representative of the suburbs, recorded 98mm of rainfall in the same period. Thane recorded 68.5mm rain between 3.30pm and 7.30pm on Saturday.

The weather department classifies 15.6mm to 64.4mm of rain in 24 hours as ‘moderate’, 64.5mm to 115.5mm as ‘heavy’, 115.6mm to 204.4mm as ‘very heavy’ and more than 204.5mm as ‘extreme’.

“The southwest monsoon has further advanced into most parts of central Arabian Sea, most parts of Konkan, some parts of central Maharashtra, Marathawada, Vidarbha, Chhattisgarh, Odisha and northwest Bay of Bengal,” read the IMD release on Saturday. “The northern limit of monsoon passes through Mumbai, Thane, Ahmednagar, Parbhani, Yavatmal, and Brahmapuri over Maharashtra.”

The IMD had forecast extremely heavy rainfall over the weekend on Friday after the monsoon made landfall over southern Konkan. Last year, the monsoon onset was delayed by almost 10 days and by four days in 2016.

Moderate to heavy showers on Saturday brought down the day temperature, both in the suburbs and south Mumbai, 5 degrees Celsius below normal. While Colaba recorded 28.2 degrees Celsius, 5 degrees Celsius below normal, 28.6 degrees Celsius was recorded at Santacruz, 4.6 degree Celsius below normal. The night temperature was 2.5 degree Celsius below normal at 24.5 degrees Celsius at Colaba, while Santacruz recorded 24.5 degrees Celsius, 2.3 degree Celsius below normal.

The weather bureau said intermittent rain or thundershowers are expected to continue in the city and suburbs with heavy to very heavy falls at a few places till Sunday night and heavy rain till Monday. “With the monsoon current over Mumbai, and a trough (weather system) extending from the Konkan coast to Kerala, which has led to an increase in the pressure gradient over the coast that has enhanced monsoon activity,” said KS Hosalikar, deputy director general, western region, IMD. “While south Mumbai has recorded more rain than the suburbs, there are some locations in both districts that have recorded very heavy rainfall as well.” He added that from Sunday night, the rainfall intensity is expected to reduce.