Over 30 people are believed to have died in Friday’s cloudburst in Uttarakhand
Thiruvananthapuram: Friday’s cloudburst over Uttarakhand, which is believed to have led to the deaths of over 30 people, could just be a sample of what is to come during the rest of the week, according to the US Climate Prediction Centre.
The US agency has indicated the possibility of floods/landslides for the eastern parts of the Himalayas in east Uttar Pradesh and Bihar (bordering Nepal), Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh during this period.
No respite
There will not be any respite for the adjoining plains either as the monsoon gets active over all of East India, covering Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, east Madhya Pradesh, Gangetic West Bengal, south Gujarat, Konkan-Mumbai-Goa and coastal Karnataka during the week to July 6.
The emerging wet spell may wallop the rest (the plains) of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar with a western limb extending into Delhi, Haryana and Punjab, too.
This phase will be masterminded by a low-pressure area over the North-west Bay of Bengal, which is expected to enter land across the Odisha coast and make its way towards Rajasthan.
It will bring pouring rain all the way in, and on Friday the India Met Department assessed conditions as favourable for the monsoon to announce its arrival over more parts of North-West India.
The forecast
Over the next two days, the rains are expected to enter more parts of east Rajasthan, the remaining parts of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, most parts of Punjab and Haryana, all of Chandigarh and Delhi and even parts of West Rajasthan.
During the 24 hours ending Friday morning, heavy rainfall with isolated cases of extreme rainfall was reported from Konkan-Goa; heavy rainfall was reported in isolated places over Sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Madhya Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Odisha.
Sustained precipitation
The first monsoon month of June may have delivered a rainfall deficit of 11 per cent, but the picture is likely be different in July, according to the US agency.
The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts tends to agree with the outlook, predicting a rather heavy monsoon during the first 10 days of this month.
More lows coming
The European agency is of the view that the current ‘low’ looking to enter land and spearhead the monsoon will be followed by another towards the end of the first week of the month.
A storm tracker featured by the US Climate Prediction Centre suggests that the North Bay of Bengal will remain ‘active’ through the first 15 days of July, sending in one ‘low’ after the other into the hinterland.
This would in turn keep the monsoon active variously over the entire northern half of the country, with heavy rains indicated for even Gujarat during a particular phase.
The US Climate Prediction Centre is of the view that the period from July 7-13 could bring heavy rain into Gujarat after a ‘low’ travels straight to the West across Central India and triggers a flare-up.
Adjoining Mumbai and Konkan would alsoreceive heavy to very rain during this period, the agency said.