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India Met Department has declared the birth of Tropical Cyclone Hud Hud, the first ahead of the northeast monsoon this year.
The Met said in its latest update that the deep depression over north Andaman Sea moved west-northwestward to intensify as a cyclone.
VERY SEVERE CYCLONE
It is in the process of crossing the Andaman and Nicobar Islands close to Long Island. Thereafter, the system would continue to move west-northwestwards, intensify further into a severe cyclonic storm by tomorrow.
It would intensify into a very severe cyclone, only a notch below the class-topping super cyclone (Category-5 on the Saffir-Simpson scale of storm intensity).
The system is expected to cross north coastal Andhra Pradesh and south Odisha coast between Visakhapatnam and Gopalpur around noon of Saturday.
WEATHER WARNING
Heavy to very heavy rainfall has been forecast at a few places with isolated extremely heavy falls would occur over south Odisha from Friday evening onwards.
Heavy to very heavy rainfall would commence over Visakhapatnam, Vijayanagaram. Srikakulam districts of north coastal Andhra Pradesh and north coastal Odisha during the same period.
WIND WARNING
Squally wind speed reaching 50- to 60 km/hr gusting to 70 km/hr would lash the north Andhra and Odisha coasts from Friday morning onwards.
The wind speed would increase to 130-140 km/hr gusting to 150 from Saturday morning.
Sea condition would be rough to very rough along these coasts from Friday morning. It would gradually become ‘phenomenal’ (severely rough) from Saturday morning.
Earlier this morning, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning had forecast that the system would ramp up into a very severe cyclonic storm - ahead of landfall on Saturday/Sunday.
Meanwhile, Typhoon Vongfong in northwest Pacific, which was instrumental in the hand-holding of the Bay system during its teething phase, has now been declared a super typhoon.
PACIFIC SUPER TYPHOON
The Bay system, according to the US Navy forecaster, would reach menacingly close with a profile that ranks only a notch below (Category-4) eve while still being based over the waters.
This begs the question if the short haul ahead of landfall would give it the breathing space to become a super cyclone (Category-5).
India Met had lowered down the expected peak wind speeds and gusts (140 km/hr to 155) km/hr) associated with the system than those projected by the US counterpart (148 km/hr to 187 km/hr).
But the two joined other major international models to suggest Andhra Pradesh-Odisha coasts to be the target for landfall for the building storm.
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