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The India Met Department (IMD) has warned that squally winds reaching 45 to 55 km/hr and gusting to 65 km/hr are likely to commence along and off the Odisha and West Bengal coasts from Thursday morning.
Fishermen are advised not to venture into sea along and off the Odisha and West Bengal coasts with effect from the same morning.
LIKELY INTENSIFICATION
This is in view of a deep depression in the Bay of Bengal, which is expected to intensify into a cyclone soon, and likely approach India's East Coast for landfall.
The IMD said the slow-moving system would reach the North-west Bay of Bengal, off the Andhra Pradesh and Odisha coasts, by the morning of October 27.
It said the system lay practically stationary through this morning and signalled a long haul for it in the Bay waters before it can reach the nearby coast.
The IMD located the storm 520 km north-northeast of Port Blair and 310 km west-southwest of Yangon, Myanmar. It will most likely intensify into a cyclonic storm during the next 24 hours.
CHANGES COURSE
The US Joint Typhoon Warning Centre (JTWC) said in an update issued at 1300 hours that the deep depression has already changed course to put it path on a course towards the East Coast of India.
The initial track towards Myanmar had been dispensed with, and the storm had effectively negotiated the turn north-northwestward, the JTWC said.
The JTWC located the storm 819 km to the south-east of Kolkata around noon. The system has enough scope left for intensification as a tropical cyclone.
Corroborating JTWC, the IMD said the system may move northward later, followed by a course north-northwestward and later north-westward, which would put it on a course towards the East coast.
WARM WATERS
But the IMD has withdrawn its outlook for its further intensification as a severe cyclonic storm ahead of landfall, although some of the global models continue to retain the same.
The longer stay in the warm water should normally allow for intensification, provided other parameters, including the wind shear effect from the top, behaves.
The US model has indicated that the shear effect would reduce allowing the cyclone to maintain the structure of the storm tower and, in turn, intensify.
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