The ongoing strong monsoon has brought down the rain deficit to 27 per cent as on Thursday (from a high of 33 per cent at June-end) and 6 per cent for the week to date, for the country as a whole.
A causative well-marked low-pressure area showed no signs of weakening after three hyperactive days generating copious rainfall over many parts of East, Central, West and even parts of Peninsular India.
The well-marked ‘low’ may not have intensified further as a depression, but its slow pace and longevity caused more rain than an actual depression could possibly have produced.
Dramatic results
This is because when a conventional ‘low’ really digs its heels in, it can return dramatic results, especially when fed by prodigious monsoon flows from both the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea.
Wind-wield projections by the India Met Department (IMD) suggest that another ‘low’ may be in the offing over the Head Bay (northern-most part of the Bay along the Bengal coast), promising a more wet spell for the plains of North India.
But its track for onward movement is projected to be too close to the foothills; it could signal the prospect of the monsoon going into a ‘break phase’, when rains halt over large parts of the country except parts of the East Coast.
However, a weather outlook for the next two weeks by the Climate Prediction Centre of the US National Weather Service seems to suggest a fresh rain spell for South India from July 10 to 16.
Spell for South?
The Global Ensemble Forecast System as well as the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasts too point to this scenario, attributing the same to an incoming Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) wave.
Tracking periodically from West to East, the MJO wave sets up cloud and rainfall under its footprint, and is forecast to travel over the North Indian Ocean (South Arabian Sea) during the second week of July and further East.
The US agency has forecast above-normal rainfall for North India during the ongoing week (July 3 to 9) while during the following week (July 10 to 16), enhanced rainfall is favoured for the South.
West Maharashtra, Telangana, Rayalaseema, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu may variously benefit from this spell, according to the US agency.