The Hindu Business Line : Bay `low' becomes marked, prowls outer seas

Thiruvananthapuram June 20 The `low' in the east-central Bay of Bengal underwent one round of intensification to become `well marked' on Wednesday, a spin away from being classified as a depression.

India Meteorological Department (IMD) has mounted a 24-hour-watch for the system to actually churn up as one. The Fleet Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Centre (FNMOC) of the US Military located the system to 165 nautical miles (300 km) west of the Andaman Islands (12.6 deg N latitude and 90.0 E longitude, corresponding to Puducherry's location over land).

Call on rain amounts

IMD has warned of isolated extremely heavy rains of more than 25 cm battering coastal Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Vidarbha from Thursday to Saturday and coastal Karnataka, the rest Maharashtra (including Mumbai), Goa and Gujarat, from Saturday to Tuesday next.

The FNMOC says that satellite imagery of the Bay reveals increasing deep convection near a developing mid to low level circulation centre. Maximum sustained surface winds are estimated at 15 to 20 knots, while the minimum sea level pressure is near 1002 millibars. A fall in pressure of 1.5 millibars has been observed during the last 24 hours.

The system is endowed with favourable divergence in the upper level environment but a strong tropical easterly jet is contributing to 20-30 knots of vertical wind shear over the disturbance. But wind shear tendency plotted by the University of Wisconsin-Madison graphics tend to favour progressive reduction in shear values.

Marginal cyclone

High wind shear values are detrimental to storm building activity, but anticipated reduction in these values augurs well for the system. Dr Akhilesh Gupta, Advisor to the Department of Science and Technology, depicted a scenario where the system spins away to become a cyclone of marginal strength.

The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF sees two more Bay cyclones in the making.

The first one would materialise as the existing system barrels into Andhra Pradesh, but a remnant is seen straying into the east and setting up the second would-be cyclone over the Head Bay. Dr Gupta said it was too early to take a call on the powerful cyclone that ECMWF is predicting in the Head Bay.

Wind shear values may be turning favourable, but the `hop' over the seawaters to the east is too short (compared to the entire diagonal length of the Arabian Sea scorched by super cyclone Gonu) for it to ratchet up to cyclone strength.

Monsoon to advance

IMD expected the existing well marked low to become a depression by Thursday and to move in a west-northwesterly direction across north Andhra Pradesh, Vidarbha, Madhya Maharashtra and Gujarat.

Widespread rains with scattered heavy to very heavy falls are likely over Andhra Pradesh, south Orissa, south Chhattisgarh and Vidarbha from Thursday to Saturday. The west-northwestward movement of the system will take the enhanced rainfall belt to the rest of Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, south Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and southeast Rajasthan.

With this, the monsoon is likely to advance further into remaining parts of Orissa, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra, entire Gujarat, and parts of Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan during the next five days. An active offshore trough will bring widespread rainfall with scattered heavy to very heavy falls to the west coast.

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