Rain fury toll increases to 680 Above normal rainfall likely in September: IMD
About 1.5 mn people in Assam, Bihar, J’khand and UP have been affected due to the floods in the last 2 days: MHA report
Chetan Chauhan and Neeraj Santoshi
At least 13 people were killed in rain-related incidents in the past 24 hours as heavy downpour continued to pound various parts of the country, data released by the Union home ministry said on Wednesday.
More than 680 people have died since June 1, when the monsoon officially arrived in the country, it added.
While large-scale flooding displaced thousands of people in Assam, Bihar and some parts of West Bengal, landslides triggered by heavy rain continued to wreak havoc in parts of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh.
The ministry’s report on the flood situation said that 22 districts of Assam, 36 of Bihar, 12 of Uttar Pradesh and two each of West Bengal and Jharkhand were affected due to rise in water level in several rivers. About 1.5 million people in these states have been affected due to the floods in the past 48 hours alone, the report added.
Data released by the disaster management departments of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand said the two states recorded more landslides this year when compared to previous years, even though rainfall has been lower. Although rainfall in Uttarakhand was deficient by around 5% this year, the state reported a 32% increase in landslides, as per data from the state public works department. Over 135 people have been killed in over 1,200 incidents such as landslides and boulder falls, or were washed away in swollen rivers this year.
Himachal, which reported 44% deficit in August, reported a 60% increase in landslides this year, according to the state disaster management authority. About 150 deaths were reported from the state so far this rainy season.
Assam is witnessing floods despite less than normal rainfall. “For the month of August, the state received 296.3 mm rainfall against the normal of 347.1 mm,” Sumit Das, senior scientist at Guwahati-based regional meteorological office, said.
Till August-end, Bihar received 801.9 mm of rain as compared to the normal of 1,027 mm, even as 32 of the total 40 districts remained flooded, displacing over a million people.
While half of Odisha is witnessing drought-like conditions, the
THE MONSOON ENTERED A BREAK OR A PARTIAL BREAK PHASE THREE TIMES THIS SEASON, WITH THE LONGEST AND DRIEST PHASE BETWEEN JUNE 29 AND JULY 11
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two neighbouring states of West Bengal and Jharkhand recorded flooding in some districts. Both the states have received up to 8% excess rain, which is considered normal. Burdwan district in Bengal received around 40% more rain above normal. Last week, Cooch Behar received 136% excess rain while North Dinajpur received 98% excess rain. In Jharkhand, Ranchi and its neighbouring districts received 20% excess rainfall this monsoon. Around 75 people have died so far this monsoon season in rain-related incidents in Bengal.
Maharashtra, which has seen very high rainfall in the past two months, witnessed excess rainfall in 16 districts, including Mumbai and Nashik. The rainfall is up to 371% higher than normal for this period, according to IMD’S local weather office.
Extremely heavy rainfall in the last two months which led to high-intensity floods and landslides resulted in the deaths of nearly 300 people and displaced over 450,000 people across the state, officials familiar with the matter said. While the western and some parts of northeastern Madhya Pradesh received heavy rainfall in the past two days, there has been no flood-like situation in the state, officials said. The state has recorded 720.8 mm rainfall so far while it received 254 mm rainfall in August alone, officials said, adding that there has been an overall rainfall deficiency of 7% this year.
With the IMD predicting above-normal rainfall in September, the current rain deficiency of 9% over the country is likely to decrease and hence, the overall monsoon rain (June 1 to September 30) is likely to be in the “lower end of normal category”. Despite having more dry days than previous years, extreme rainfall in the month of August increased this year in some states, the IMD said.
There is likely to be above normal rainfall activity at over 110% of the so-called long period average or LPA in September, and while this will reduce the current monsoon rain deficiency of 9% over the country, overall monsoon rain (June 1 to September 30) will still be in the “lower end of normal category,” the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said in its monsoon monthly forecast on Wednesday. The weather office also admitted that its model got the August forecast wrong.
The LPA of rainfall during September, based on the data of 1961-2010, is about 170mm. IMD defines as normal for entire country rainfall of 96% to 104% of LPA, and its Wednesday forecast suggests that this year’s overall monsoon rains will be closer to the 4% deficient bound.
The LPA for the entire season is 880mm.
In September, according to IMD, above normal rainfall activity is likely over many parts of central India, and normal to below normal rainfall is likely over many areas of north-west, north-east and southern most parts of peninsular India.
IMD forecast normal rain in August over the country as a whole at 94% to 106% of LPA, but got this wrong. August reported a 24% deficiency due to a subdued monsoon phase till around August 17. In its longrange forecast, IMD said the south-west monsoon seasonal rain (June to September) over the country as a whole is likely to be normal (96% to 104% of LPA) at about 101% of the LPA with an error of ±4%. This assessment has now been downgraded to the lower end of the normal (up to 20% deficient) category on Wednesday.
IMD on Wednesday acknowledged that its multi-model ensemble forecasting system got its August rainfall prediction wrong. “Though the model partially picked up the spatial pattern of rains in August, it couldn’t pick up the magnitude of rain in August. We will examine this and endeavour to improve the output,” said M Mohapatra, director general, IMD. The model also couldn’t capture severe rainfall deficiency over Gujarat and Odisha.
Long periods of subdued rain in July and August have impacted
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agriculture. There is deficiency in sowing in many parts of central India, Mohapatra said.
The monsoon entered a break or a partial break phase three times this season, with the longest and driest phase between June 29 and July 11. It revived over northwest India on August 19, but weakened again from August 24 onwards and started reviving gradually from August 29.
According to IMD, the main reasons for the subdued monsoon in August is what is called a negative Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) which is normally unfavourable for monsoon; and complete absence of formation of monsoon depressions in August (normally at least two depressions form in August. There was very less typhoon activity over the West Pacific. The remnants of these typhoons move westwards normally and help in creating low pressure areas over Bay of Bengal.
IOD is a phenomenon where the western Indian ocean becomes warmer than the eastern one. A positive IOD effect is associated with a better monsoon in India. Now IMD expects La Nina conditions to set in by end of monsoon season.
“There will be colder sea surface temperatures across the east equatorial Pacific Ocean which improves monsoon flow over India. At the same time we have negative IOD conditions which subdues monsoon. Together we can expect normal monsoon in September,” Mohapatra said.
La Nina, a cooling of sea surfaces near the Peru coast, affects the Indian monsoon positively.
IMD also acknowledged that monsoon rain patterns are skewed and often a lot of rain is recorded during a few hours instead of being evenly distributed during the month. “Yes this pattern can hamper agriculture. The solution is rainwater harvesting,” Mohapatra said.