The rainmaker monsoon trough over North India has shifted alignment further to the North with its western end anchored over Amritsar with its body and tail running across Karnal, Bareilly, Ballia, Patna and Bhagalpur and its end running close to the foothills of the Himalayas.

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Podcast | Weather report: July 9, 2020

This is synonymous with monsoon-break-like conditions when rains weaken over the West Coast, Central and adjoining Peninsular India though isolated flare-ups occur at times. In contrast, rains scale up over East and North-East India and parts of the East Coast, though low in intensity.

Monsoon above normal

This has come at a time when the monsoon has continued its above-normal precipitation from June into the second week of July. The country as a whole has received above normal rainfall of 13 per cent till Thursday (June 1-July 9). Tamil Nadu has dramatically returned to the normal category (in fact 17 per cent rainfall above normal and is inching closer to the excess rainfall mark of 20 per cent and above).

But Kerala and Lakshadweep represent the other end with a deficit of 18 per cent reach and tottering close to the deficit (-19 per cent and lower). Central India has turned in a good account for itself except East Gujarat which is in deficit (-33 per cent). In the North-West, Himachal Pradesh (-24 per cent) and Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh (-47 per cent) are nursing deficits too.

In the North-East, Nagaland-Manipur-Mizoram-Tripura has a deficit of 33 per cent, mainly attributable to the very high averages applicable there. With the shifting of the monsoon towards this region as also to the foothills of the Himalayas, the rainfall figures are expected to improve over North-West India as well as East and North-East India replete with flood events, especially in the latter.

Heavy rains recorded

The 24 hours ending on Thursday morning saw heavy to extremely heavy rainfall being reported across the landscape though at times far apart. These include (in cm): Cherrapunji-23; Uttara Kannada-17; Lower Dibang Valley and Prakasham-16 each; Shivamogga, Sindhudurg, Kokrajhar and Guntur-15 each; Pashighat, East Siang and Chirang-14 each; Kolar, East Champaran, Supaul, Jalpaiguri, Krishna, West Godavari and Vijayawada-12 each; Ratnagiri, Satara, Barpeta, Kothagudem, Mahabaleshwar and Harnai-11 each; Udupi, Dhemaji, Shirali, Fatehpur and North Lakhimpur-10 each.

In contrast, counterpart rainmaker offshore trough along the West Coast lies in a shambles and was located farther away into the sea. The land-based trough over North India will continue to witness convergence of south-westerly/southerly winds from the Bay of Bengal, the IMD said.

This would bring continue to bring fairly widespread to widespread rainfall with isolated heavy to very heavy falls over Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, northern parts of Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, hills of West Bengal, Sikkim and the North-Eastern states during the next five days.

Lightning and thunderstorm alert

Isolated extremely heavy falls have been forecast over Uttarakhand and West Uttar Pradesh on Saturday and Sunday; East Uttar Pradesh during on Friday to Sunday; Bihar on Friday and Saturday; hills of West Bengal, Sikkim, Assam, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh from Thursday to Saturday.

The IMD has also issued a warning about moderate to intense thunderstorm and lightning over East Uttar Pradesh, adjoining West Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, East Madhya Pradesh, North Chhattisgarh, hills of West Bengal, Sikkim, Assam and Meghalaya.

An extended IMD warning for July 14-16 said that fairly widespread to widespread rainfall or thundershowers with isolated intense falls is likely over the North-East and adjoining East India; plains of North-West India and along the West coast. It would be scattered to fairly widespread with isolated intense falls over the Islands, Central India and parts of the South Peninsula.

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