The progress of the monsoon along the West Coast has slowed after the offshore trough, which acts as its spine, weakened from yesterday.

Satellite pictures this afternoon showed rain-bearing clouds having reached the Ratnagiri-Ganpati Phule-Dapoli-Harihareshwar stretch, some distance south of Mumbai.

Northern limit

The northern limit of the monsoon (south of which has already been covered) continued to pass through Karwar, Gadag, and Ongole, and then into the Bay of Bengal.

The monsoon has already covered Kerala, Tamil Nadu, most parts of South Interior Karnataka, Coastal Karnataka, and some parts of South Andhra Pradesh.

India Met Department has forecast heavy to very heavy rainfall Konkan, Goa, Coastal Karnataka and Kerala for today and tomorrow.

There is a scale-up of rain indicated for Sub-Himalayan West Bengal and the rest of the Northeastern-States for the next three days before fresh action begins from the South.

Fresh rain pulse

Coastal and South Interior Karnataka and Kerala may start receiving thundershowers from June 16, according to the Met Department.

The US Climate Prediction Centre agrees with this outlook and points to an increase in rainfall over Coastal Karnataka, Goa and Konkan during the week beginning June 18.

Rains are also indicated for parts of Central India and East India, including Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh during this period.

The offshore trough, now a feeble feature, is forecast to come back to life after June 16, according to available indications.

This would bring back rains and showers over the West Coast, more specifically to the northern parts, including Konkan and Goa.

Extended forecast

An extended range weather forecast for the period from June 10 to June 23 issued by India Met Department in association with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture has indicated the following:

Normal or above normal rainfall is likely to occur over Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, Konkan, Goa, Coastal Karnataka and Kerala.

Normal or above normal rainfall is likely to occur in either of the two weeks in Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand, Gangetic West Bengal, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Maharashtra, Marathwada, Vidarbha, Telangana, Coastal Andhra Pradesh, Rayalaseema, Interior Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

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