North to get more rains even as monsoon stays quiet over South

Vinson Kuria

A fisherman winds up his activities as dark monsoon clouds gather over the Brahmaputra river in Guwahati Ritu Raj Konwar

Thiruvananthapuram, September 4

As a dry spell entrenched itself over most parts of the peninsula, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said that the northern parts of the country would not have any respite from active monsoon conditions.

This is in view of the expected formation of a low-pressure area over the North Bay of Bengal over the next two days, after it missed a date with the region around the first of this month.

Dry spell in South

According to the IMD’s wind-field projections, the system will track in a west-north-westerly track cutting across Bihar, Jharkhand, West Uttar Pradesh and winding up over Delhi and its neighbourhood.

This effectively means that the atmosphere over Rajasthan is no longer conducive to receive rain systems originating from the Bay since it is transitioning into its monsoon withdrawal mode.

September 1 is the normal date of withdrawal for the monsoon in a month-long procedure that progressively covers the rest of the country.

Peninsular India will not benefit too much from the brewing ‘low’ since it forms too far from the north of the Bay and because of its own internal dynamics at a time when the Arabian Sea flows are indifferent.

According to the Climate Prediction Centre of the US National Weather Services, the dry spell over the peninsula may extend for another week (till September 11).

More ‘low’s seen

An ensemble model of the US agency says the monsoon circulations may linger over the East Coast, mainly along and off the Andhra Pradesh and Odisha coasts, into September 20.

It sees the last one among these emerging as a conventional ‘low’ and making its presence felt along the foothills of the Himalayas across Bihar and Uttar Pradesh before winding up over Uttarakhand.

Projections by the IMD indicate that there is scope for at least one more ‘low’ to form over the North Bay by September 13, although this needs to be watched empirically for confirmation.

It said that fairly widespread to widespread rainfall activity with isolated heavy falls is likely to continue over Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand during the next three days.

Heavy showers

Heavy to very heavy and isolated extremely heavy falls are likely over parts of North-West Madhya Pradesh and adjoining areas during the next two days, it added.

As for Wednesday, the IMD has forecast heavy to very heavy rain with extremely heavy rain over Odisha.

It will be heavy over Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, the plains of Bengal, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, East Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, in the run-up to the formation of the ‘low.’

Rough to very rough sea conditions are likely over the North Bay off the Odisha, Bengal and Bangladesh coasts. Fishermen are advised not to venture into the sea in these areas.

Published on September 04, 2018

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