Centre...

Every year, Mumbai receives considerably heavy rainfall during the monsoon, often causing flooding in several low-lying areas and throwing public transporting off gear. Between 8.30am on July 9 and 8.30am on July 10, the city recorded 184.3mm rain — the highest on a July day since 2015. Further, Mumbai has also been receiving short duration rainfall events that dump large quantities of rain over short periods of time — recently, scientists from India and the US even gave this phenomenon a name, a mini cloudburst, when there is more than 50mm rain over two consecutive hours. The ministry has also launched a slew of other weather-related apps, including one that will keep pilgrims on the Amarnath yatra and Chardham yatra routes updated about conditions. “We hope to extend this to all tourist destinations in India,” said KJ Ramesh, the director general of the India Meteorological Department (IMD).

The IMD has also launched a lightning monitoring module on its website that gives information about lightning strikes in 10-, 20-and 30-minute intervals.

An inter ministerial group headed by the secretary, ministry of earth sciences, has also been set up to develop an air pollution emergency prediction system for Delhi, while another ambitious project in the works is the Deep Ocean mission, which will allow India to assess deep sea mining potential, test underwater vehicles and make progress in underwater robotics.

“What Isro has done in space, we want to do in deep sea,” Rajeevan said. A proposal for the project has been sent to the Prime Minister’s office.