The monsoon has further advanced into the Minicoy, the southern-most island of Lakshadweep and entire Comorin area, some more parts of the South Arabian Sea and the Maldives, some more parts of South and adjoining East-Central Bay of Bengal on Friday. Its northern limit passed through Sri Lanka, delaying the monsoon into the island nation by at least 10 days.
Arc of northern limit
The northern limit passed through Minicoy, the southern-most island in Lakshadweep, situated 398 km to the South-West of Kochi in Kerala. The imaginary arc links South-Central Arabian Sea and the seas South-West of Maldives to Lotte on the Sri Lanka coast before it runs into the South-West, East-Central and North-East Bay of Bengal while culminating over Central Myanmar. On Friday, the IMD refrained from issuing a forward-looking statement on further advancement of the monsoon.
Meanwhile, the Myanmar Department of Meteorology and Hydrology has said the monsoon is likely to set in over Central Myanmar during June 1-5 and cover the whole country during June 6-10. It expects a low- pressure area to develop over the Andaman Sea and adjoining Bay during June 5-10, which could likely intensify into a depression. The IMD said a preparatory cyclonic circulation persisted over the East-Central Bay off the Myanmar coast on Friday.
Buzz in Bay, Arabian Sea
Evolution of the likely depression over the Bay would mostly coincide with the formation of a compatriot cyclonic circulation over the South-East Arabian Sea around Lakshadweep around Monday (June 5). This is likely to deepen as a low-pressure area over the subsequent two days. Together, these systems could set up favourable monsoon onset conditions over Kerala.
Over Sri Lanka, the onset has been muted with westerly to south-westerly winds not ratcheting up to desirable strength along the gateway cities of Galle, Colombo, Mannar and Jaffna along the coast. Wind speeds on Friday morning ranged between 9- to 11 km/hr though humidity was high at 85 per cent at Galle and Jaffna. Showers were forecast for the day at all locations. These data were derived from secondary sources since official Sri Lankan agency has not been accessible for many days now.
Strong monsoon in Maldives
Further upstream, the monsoon continues to be moderate to strong over the Maldives with forecast till Saturday morning predicting scattered rain with heavy showers and thunderstorms. Winds are expected to gather speed ranging from 24 to 43 km/hr gusting to near-cyclonic 74 km/hr. But forecast for June as a whole indicated below-normal rain for the atolls here.
Back home, the IMD has maintained the outlook for light/moderate to fairly widespread rain, thunderstorms, lightning and gusty winds for Kerala, Lakshadweep, Coastal and South Interior Karnataka and isolated to scattered rainfall over Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh for next five days. Heavy rainfall is likely at isolated places over Kerala for three days from Saturday to Monday.