In 122 years, last decade gave Pune maximum intense rain spells

PUNE: In the last 122 years, the maximum number of short but intense rainfall events in the city have occurred during the last decade, IMD data shows.
This is in sharp contrast to the rainfall pattern during the last century. The city's 24-hour rainfall crossed 100mm in October only once during a 109-year period (1901 to 2009) - in October 1938.
Pulak Guhathakurta, head of the climate research division in India Meteorological Department (IMD), Pune, told TOI, "This has, however, changed in the past 12 years, during which the city had five occasions when rainfall in a 24-hour period crossed 100 mm (2010, 2011, 2017, 2020, 2022). Monday night's showers (104.6 mm) was the fifth time in the last 12 years when Pune received a deluge of rain that crossed 100 mm in just an hour."
Rainfall during Monday night was the fifth highest one-day amount for October in the last 122 years in Shivajinagar, said Guhathakurta. “The highest 24-hour October rainfall is 181.1 mm recorded in 2010, followed by 112.1mm in October 2020. The third highest October rainfall recorded during a single day was 111.5 mm in 1938, while the fourth highest was 105.1mm in 2011,” he said.
“The data shows that most of these spells were recorded in the recent decade. or after 2009. Most spells in October are of a convective nature because they occur as part of the retreating monsoon,” said Guhathakurta. Climate change expert Vimal Mishra, associate professor at IIT in Gandhinagar, said, “One of our studies, which simulated rainfall in 89 Indian cities, including Pune, under different climate scenarios had earlier found that three hourly rainfall extremes surged by about 20% when global mean temperatures rose by 1.5°C in comparison to the preindustrial era.”
He added, “The projected warming results in a much faster (almost twice) increase in 3-hourly rainfall, than the 24-hourly rainfall. Moreover, the three-hourly rainfall events are projected to increase significantly at 78 locations (out of 89) if the global mean temperatures increase from 1.5°C to 2.0°C from the preindustrial level.”