"The installation works will be completed before the monsoon season," added Hosalikar. (Representational) The India Meteorological Department (IMD) is planning to expand its weather observational network in the coming months and at least 10 additional weather stations will be installed in Pune district for round-the-clock monitoring. With the city limits growing, the IMD has taken up the task of installing the observation stations in a phased manner.
“People in Pune have been very cooperative, especially the farmers who willingly offer IMD some space to install the AWS (automatic weather stations). Besides, there have also been colleges and institutions which have expressed desire to allocate space for setting up our instruments,” said K S Hosalikar, head, Climate Research and Services of IMD, Pune.
At present, manual observations are taken or observations obtained through the AWS installed at 25 locations where key parameters like temperatures, rainfall, pressure, humidity, wind speed and gusts are recorded at regular time.
Currently, observations are obtained from Shivajinagar, Pashan, the National Defence Academy (NDA), Lohegaon, Lavale, Chinchwad, Wadgaonsheri, Magarpatta, Khed, Bhor, Ballalwadi, Ambegaon, Junnar, Dhamdhere, Daund, Nimgiri, Girivan, Indapur, Purandar, Baramati, Rajgurunagar, Talegaon, Malin, Haveli and Shirur. At nine of these locations, there are also Automatic Rain Gauges installed to monitor rainfall.
“The installation works will be completed before the monsoon season,” added Hosalikar.
The Surface Instruments Division at IMD, Pune is responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of instruments. Fast advancing technology is also adding to the requirement of designing the latest instruments for uninterrupted weather observations.
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