Rainfall to increase along the West Coast from Saturday

The India Met Department has indicated that rain or thunderstorms along the West Coast will increase in strength from Saturday (June 4).

Heavy rain has been forecast for isolated places over South Interior Karnataka and adjoining Coastal Karnataka from two days ahead (Thursday and Friday).

The increase in rain/thunderstorms would likely be overseen by a cyclonic circulation that has been sitting over Lakshadweep and adjoining Kerala over the past two days and which persisted on Monday.

According to the US Centre for Climate Prediction, this circulation may descend to lower levels and convert itself to a low-pressure area (‘low’).

This conversion might materialise over the next four days and the projected ‘low’ move north along the coast towards Konkan-Mumbai and South Gujarat.

It is then forecast to emerge over land around the Amreli-Bhavnagar coast and wade into adjoining South Rajasthan where it would meet up with an incoming western disturbance.

This, according to the US agency forecasts, could bring scattered to widespread unseasonal showers for practically the whole of North-West India during the first week of June.

Meanwhile, heavy to very heavy rain will have been triggered along the stretch beginning from Coastal Karnataka, Goa, Konkan, Mumbai and South Gujarat as the ‘low’ tracks overhead.

Practically the whole of the country except Kerala and southern Tamil Nadu is forecast to receive normal to above normal rainfall for the week starting June 5 (Sunday). Goa, Konkan, Mumbai and South Gujarat may receive to very heavy rainfall during the period even as excess showers spread out into North Rajasthan, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.

The onset of the South-West monsoon over Kerala is likely to be declared during this phase since it correlates to India Met Department’s timeline of the June 7 mean with a model error of four days.

An extended range forecast projected by the IMD’s agro-met service bulletin had lately said that the onset is likely to happen between June 3 and June 9.

Meanwhile, thunderstorms are lining up all along over the plains of North-West India on Monday which has helped bring down the mercury level in the region significantly.

Thunderstorms accompanied by squall have been forecast over Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, East Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, and West Madhya Pradesh.

East India/North-East India too will receive rain or thundershowers on Tuesday.

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