Monsoon in Capital by June 15, 13 days ahead of schedule: Met

NEW DELHI: The south-west monsoon is set to reach Delhi and most of north-west India by June 15, almost a fortnight ahead of schedule, due to a low pressure system building up over the Bay of Bengal, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Friday.

The Met’s forecast also said that pre-monsoon showers are expected to start in the Capital from Saturday, and intensify on Sunday and Monday. This, analysts said, will lead to moderate to heavy rainfall, hail and thunderstorms, and bring down day temperatures in parts of the city to around 34 degrees Celsius.

Some parts of Delhi got light rain and dust storms late on Thursday and early on Friday.

The monsoon usually arrives in Delhi by June 27-28, and Kuldeep Srivastava, the head of IMD’S regional weather forecasting centre, said it was set to advance swiftly this year due to weather conditions in the northern Bay of Bengal. “The reason behind this sudden advancement is the formation of a lowpressure system over northern Bay of Bengal. When a low-pressure area is formed at the onset of monsoon, it creates conditions that are conducive for the advancement of monsoon.”

The weather pattern since August 2020 has thrown up a surprise and broken a historical record every single month -either by being hotter, wetter, or colder than usual. This, for example, is likely to be the first June to not get a single heatwave day as rain brings down the temperature further.