The Hindu Business Line : Rains may reach Mumbai, North-East by June 10

Thiruvananthapuram, June 2 The Arabian Sea now hosts Tropical Cyclone Gonu, which is appropriating more and more of the westerly flows to further intensify into a possible severe cyclone. This is feared to prolong the hold-up in the northward progress of the monsoon.

Even the southerly surge expected from Sunday will go mostly to feed the system in a scenario that bears close resemblance to what unfolded in the Bay of Bengal when Cyclone Akash strode the sea.

FLOWS TO RE-CONVERGE

The flows are expected to re-converge around June 10, which will help free the monsoon from the forced anchorage, since May 29, over coastal Karnataka-south Konkan, said Dr Akhilesh Gupta of the Department of Science and Technology.

This will also cause the Bay of Bengal arm of monsoon to activate itself, thanks to the formation of a trough in the westerlies over the Northeastern States around that time. In this manner, the way will have been cleared for monsoon rains to reach Mumbai and the North-East almost simultaneously.

Cyclone Gonu is seen moving west-northwest and crossing Somalia by Monday. The monsoon flow over the Indian region will get temporarily weakened in the bargain, halting its progress to the north.

Advanced weather models suggest that once the cyclone weakens after crossing coast, the monsoon flow may take a couple of days to re-develop over the Arabian Sea (around June 10). A north-south trough in westerlies seen getting anchored over Northeast India will expectedly lead to a scale-up in rains over the region. This trough and developing monsoon flows will combine to push monsoon northward over peninsula (including Mumbai).

HEAT TO INTENSIFY

Meanwhile, in the north, a severe heat wave in Bihar and West Bengal is not only seen intensifying further but also spreading to Bihar, Jharkhand and even parts of Orissa. Rajasthan and Haryana in the northwest will also suffer in this manner.

Dr Gupta attributed this to the hot westerlies blowing into the Indo-Gangetic plains where soothing easterlies from the Bay of Bengal are conspicuous by their absence. Easterlies will build only with some activity being triggered in the Bay, limping back to normal after Cyclone Akash swept the area clean of moisture.

The hot westerlies have driven away the seasonal trough to the foothills of the Himalayas. It will return when the heat wave abates around June 9 under the influence of regrouping monsoon flows. The Bay will then throw up a broad-based trough, even a `low' very close to coast near Head Bay, and pump in the first few bands of easterlies into east and northwest.

The seasonal trough (which gets converted into the all-important east-west oriented monsoon in due course) had established itself around May 7.

More Stories on : Climate & Weather | Climate & Weather

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Rains may reach Mumbai, North-East by June 10

Mutual funds asset base swells

Centre bets on energy saving building code

Mahindra Renault's Logan sales at 2,786 in May

Expatriates adding to realty demand: Study

TNPL undertakes Rs 680-cr capacity expansion

Russia's VTB Bank plans corporate branch in India

RBI for flexible home loan repayment norms