The Hindu Business Line : Focus shifts to buzz in southwest Bay

Thiruvananthapuram, July 20 The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast rain or thundershowers at a few places over coastal Andhra Pradesh, Telengana and Tamil Nadu over the next few days as the buzz in the southwest Bay of Bengal becomes louder.

Meteorologists are looking for early signs of a southwest Bay-triggered wave anchored by a cyclonic circulation training rains initially into the northeast peninsula. Forecasts suggest that this may later spread laterally into the rest of the peninsula.

This outlook is well supported by the positive sea surface temperatures anomaly in the southwest and south central Bay prevailing as of Sunday. Warm seas promote convection activity and precipitation.

A helpful trough along the southeast coast is also developing with the southwesterlies from the Arabian Sea continuing to blow southeast around the peninsular point before being driven north along the southeast coast. This is another significant meteorological feature that supports the emerging weather trends along the eastern coast.

CHANGE FOR BETTER

The Climate Prediction Centre of the US National Weather Services, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting and the US-based Centre for Ocean-Land-Atmospheric Studies more or less agree with a scenario where the rain-deficit peninsular India is bracing to witness a ‘change for the better’ during the rest of July.

On the other hand, the IMD sees a fresh wave of rains progressing along the west coast three days from now, which might coincide with the spurt of activity across the peninsula along the southeast coast. The two waves are expected to act in tandem to ensure the progress of rains into the interior peninsula over the next week and a half.

On Sunday, the land-based monsoon trough passed through Ferozepur, Karnal, Bareilly, Gonda, Bhagalpur, and then eastwards into Nagaland through Bangladesh. The resident whirl over Gangetic West Bengal and adjoining Bihar and shifted to East Uttar Pradesh.

Under this scenario, fairly widespread rainfall activity with isolated heavy to very heavy falls is likely over the Northeast, sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand during the three days.

WEST COAST RAINS

Towards the west, the offshore trough from the Karnataka coast to the Kerala coast persisted and is likely to cause fairly widespread rainfall with isolated heavy falls over Coastal Karnataka, Kerala and Lakshadweep for another four days. A warning valid for the next two days said that isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall is likely over the North-East, sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Lakshadweep.

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