New Delhi: At 21% above regular, north India has to date recorded its wettest monsoon since 2013, the yr of the cataclysmic Kedarnath flash flood. Worryingly, in Aug, the area has skilled by far the very best variety of ‘extraordinarily heavy’ rain occasions for the reason that India Meteorological Division (IMD) started collating this knowledge in 2021.Until Aug 25, north India had logged 21 extraordinarily heavy rain occasions, a 50% rise over the earlier highest of 14 recorded final yr, although that month had registered larger rainfall. The variety of such occasions is prone to rise additional by the tip of the month, making this Aug’s monsoon among the many most harmful within the area lately.‘Extraordinarily heavy’ is IMD’s highest class of day by day rainfall recorded at a climate station, outlined as over 204.5mm in 24 hours.This monsoon, north India is the one one amongst India’s 4 areas to register a rain surplus in all three months (June, July, Aug) of the season to date – one other first for the North since 2013.“Within the final two months, northwest India (IMD nomenclature for north India) has seen excessive rainfall exercise primarily due to frequent interactions between western disturbances and monsoon currents from Bay of Bengal and typically from Arabian Sea. When these two currents meet over the area, a variety of rain takes place,” mentioned Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, IMD chief.North India (or northwest India) is a meteorological area comprising states/UTs of J&Ok, Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, UP and Rajasthan. Mohapatra mentioned many of the excessive rain occasions in north India had taken place within the two hill states and the UT of J&Ok.The intense rainfall knowledge for the area reveals that whereas Aug final yr had extra ‘heavy’ (64.4-115.5mm) and ‘very heavy’ (115.5-204.4mm) rain occasions, it recorded far much less variety of ‘extraordinarily heavy’ rainfall episodes than Aug this yr. Final yr, north India had reported its wettest month of Aug in 28 years since 1996, with the area as an entire logging 256.4mm of rain. The present month has to date (until Aug 26) reported 209.4mm, with 5 days nonetheless to go.“As a result of formation of a trough in jap Pakistan, the area has acquired a variety of rain prior to now 4 days. The spell is prone to proceed for one or two extra days,” Mohapatra mentioned.The final three days have been the wettest in north India this monsoon season, with August 25 alone logging 21.8mm of rain, 4 instances larger than the traditional of 5.6mm for the day.
