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India Met Department (IMD) has advanced the landfall of very severe cyclone 'Mekunu' close to the Omanese capital Salalah to midnight tonight.
The US Joint Typhoon Warning Centre agrees with the outlook, but said that 'Mekunu' could intensify briefly before it crosses coast West to Salalah by around 2 am tomorrow.
The latest outlook has prompted IMD to shorten the window for the likely onset of monsoon over South Andaman Sea, its first port of call in the Indian territory, anytime during today.
Latest coordinates
IMD had said yesterday that it expected 'Mekunu' to become an extremely severe cyclone, but has not persisted with that outlook in subsequent updates. An extremely severe cyclone is the penultimate class in IMD's protocol of assessing storms in terms of strength and intensity, topped off by a super cyclone.
The Oman Directorate-General of Meteorology said this morning that 'Mekunu' is located 200 km away off Salalah city, with the main convective band only 50 km away. Surface winds speeds had risen to 130-148 km/hr. The main convective band would approach the Dhofar coast later this morning accompanied by gale-force winds and rain.
The rainfall could range from 20-30 cm and set off flash floods. Sea waves along the Al-Wusta coasts could range from a phenomenal 26-39 feet in height. This is the outlook for the last full day of the cyclone's active life over the waters, after it blasted into the island feature of Socotra, off South Yemen, last night and picked up speed.
Past cyclone tracks
According to the UK Met Office, cyclones of the strength of 'Mekunu' have made landfall over the Arabian Peninsula in the recent past. In 2015, cyclone 'Chapala' brought flash flooding as it came ashore over Yemen. Cyclone 'Phet' brought strong winds and heavy rain to North Oman when it made landfall in 2010.
The strongest on record to make landfall over the Arabian Peninsula was super cyclone 'Gonu' in 2007 which hit North-East Oman with highest wind speeds recorded at 270 km/hr. In contrast, 'Mekunu' is much smaller, impacting the central part of the Arabian Peninsula close to the border between Oman and Yemen.
The historical record reveals that strong cyclones over this part of the peninsula are relatively rare. The most recent to make landfall close to the city of Salalah occurred in 1963 and 1959. The former produced over 20 cm of rain and caused severe sandstorms. The latter caused flooding and severe damage to buildings, the UK Met Office said.
Monsoon build-up
Even as 'Mekunu' has spun away its compliment of incoming monsoon flows and moisture, the other end of the Arabian Sea (off India's coast) has been witnessing cloud build-up. Satellite pictures this morning showed the islands of Lakshadweep, Maldives, and Sri Lanka along with India's South-West coast (Kerala) masked by thunderclouds rising into the heights.
The clouding now extends fully into the adjoining Bay of Bengal, starting off from the Tamil Nadu coast, the South-West and adjoining West-Central Bay and the Andaman Sea. This is where IMD expects the Bay 'arm' of the monsoon precipitating either today or tomorrow, with the Arabian Sea 'arm' likely materialising over the Bay early next week.
It has warned fishermen from venturing into South-East Arabian Sea, Lakshadweep and off Kerala from tomorrow in view of likely strengthening of winds in the region. It expects rains over Lakshadweep, Kerala, Coastal Karnataka and parts of adjoining interior peninsula to scale up to heavy, very heavy or even extremely heavy from Monday.
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