Monsoon advances to Mumbai on schedule
Prayag Arora-desai
MUMBAI: The southwest monsoon arrived in Mumbai on Saturday, meeting its normal onset date of June 11, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said.
“Southwest Monsoon has further advanced into remaining parts of central Arabian Sea, most parts of Konkan (including Mumbai), some parts of Madhya Maharashtra, and some more parts of Karnataka today (Saturday),” IMD said in a statement.
RK Jenamani, senior scientist at IMD’S main office in New Delhi, confirmed that the monsoon’s arrival in Mumbai has kept to its usual date of June 11. However, some experts have disputed the IMD’S decision to declare the arrival of the monsoon in the Maharashtra capital.
The IMD’S station in Santacruz, which is taken as representative of Mumbai and its suburbs, recorded 41.3mm of rain in the 24 hours ending 8.30am on Saturday, as pre-monsoon showers intensified under unstable weather conditions.
The IMD has sounded a yellow category alert for Mumbai on Sunday, indicating high chances of thunderstorms with lightning and gusty winds of around 35kmph at isolated places (as against orange category alert implying moderate to heavy rainfall). Drier conditions are expected from June 15.
IMD officials said that in the next 48 hours, the southwest monsoon is likely to advance further and cover more parts of Maharashtra, all of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, as well as parts of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. The monsoon reached Andaman and Nicobar Islands on May 16, a week ahead of its usual date, but its progress stalled since May 20. Experts and IMD officials had predicted a weak, marginally delayed onset of the monsoon, with wind conditions being unfavourable for its northward progress after arriving in Kerala on May 29. The monsoon arrived in Maharashtra only on June 10, three days delayed.
“But wind conditions have changed since then. The progress of the monsoon in the last 24 hours has become rapid, but this is not uncommon,” said KS Hosalikar, head of the IMD’S surface instrument division in Pune. “Westerly and south westerly winds, which are essential for transporting rain-bearing clouds over the Konkan coast, were very weak. They have picked up speed since Tuesday. There is also an offshore trough, or low pressure area, quite close to Mumbai, which creates a favourable gradient for moisture to travel from over the Arabian Sea, though we are not seeing the typical monsoon surge.”