The Hindu Business Line : Depression weakens, but dynamic still

Thiruvananthapuram, June 18 True to character, Tuesday’s monsoon depression over land retained strength until noon on Wednesday as it ground away flywheel-like on the flooded tracks igniting a lot of weather and causing the heavy rain belt to nudge westward into central India.

The system let off some steam in the afternoon to weaken as a well-marked ‘low’ over Jharkhand.

But flooded tracks over land works much the same way as the sea surface for a monsoon system to power its way ahead, pouring it down heavily as it did so.

The system is known to move slowly and steadily northwestward, raining across the country’s farming heartland.

For a second day running, India Meteorological Department (IMD) has issued a heavy rain warning for east and central India.

Heavy falls

Scattered rainfall with isolated heavy to very heavy falls at a few places and isolated extremely heavy falls (of up to 25 cm) is likely over Jharkhand, north Orissa and north Chhattisgarh during the next 24 hours.

Fairly widespread rainfall with isolated heavy to very falls is also likely over Gangetic West Bengal, south Orissa and south Chhattisgarh during the same period.

The principal meteorological feature that spearheaded the heavy precipitation is the well-defined seasonal trough passing through Anoopgarh, Churu, Kanpur, Gaya, the centre of the well-marked ‘low’ and into east central Bay of Bengal.

The trough doubles up as an ideal pitch for the depression to play around in full vigour.

Additionally, a cyclonic circulation lay over Haryana and neighbourhood on Wednesday, remnant of the previous western disturbance.

UNUSUAL STRENGTH

Normally, this circulation finds a way to the east in a flash, relatively speaking, but not during an active monsoon phase as is now.

Yet another upper air cyclonic circulation still hung over west Uttar Pradesh and neighbourhood, its dip to the lower troposphere indicating the unusual strength and longevity.

This has prompted the IMD to issue an alert about fairly widespread rainfall with isolated heavy falls for Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh during the next three days.

Isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall is likely over the North-eastern States also.

The rain belt will gradually become entrenched over Madhya Pradesh and Gangetic plains Friday onwards.

And this would possibly mean the lifting of the curtain of heavy falls over Orissa, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh in the rear.

Extended forecast from IMD said the rains would scale up over central India and, after some gap, along the west coast for three days starting from Friday.

But things might just get back to square one in the east, with the arrival of a fresh western disturbance from across the border. On Wednesday, the system was spotted over north Pakistan and adjoining Jammu and Kashmir.

The system would move in a trademark east-northeast direction and could run into the monsoon system and moisture-laden easterlies filling the plains and spilling into the adjoining hills.

Some models indicate that this could set off another busy session over north-central India (south-east Rajasthan and north Madhya Pradesh). The rain belt move could get a move to the east in line with the movement of the western disturbance bringing the rains back to Jharkhand and Orissa. In this manner, the active rain belt might skirt extreme west Rajasthan for the time being.

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