Monsoon bracing to enter South Arabian Sea in two days

The India Met Department (IMD) expects the monsoon to enter the extreme southern parts of the Arabian Sea and more parts of the Maldives-Comorin either today (Sunday) or tomorrow (Monday).

Almost alongside, the onset is likely to be declared over Sri Lanka, with the country's Met department saying monsoon conditions may establish over the island nation from June 3 (Monday).

HELPFUL CIRCULATION

A feeble cyclonic circulation lies over the Lakshadweep area this morning, which would move westwards (into the open waters of the Arabian Sea) without any intensification during the next two days.

Under its influence, cross-equatorial flows over the southern parts of the South Arabian Sea may intensify to advance the monsoon into the southern parts of the Arabian Sea during the next two days, the IMD said.

Some more parts of the Bay of Bengal would also get covered during this period. Southern Maldives and Central Myanmar represent the two extremes of the phalanx entering the Arabian Sea and the Bay respectively.

A helpful North-East to South-West shear zone of overall turbulence, where monsoon conditions are most active, lies in anticipation, extending from the Gulf of Martaban to the Comorin-Maldives.

The Gulf of Martaban, or the Gulf of Mottama, is an arm of the Andaman Sea in the southern part of Myanmar, and represents the north-eastern flank of the shear zone.

Meanwhile, the IMD has retained the outlook for another cyclonic circulation (monsoon vortex) taking shape off the Kerala coast, and overseeing what look like spectacular onset conditions.

SPECTACULAR ONSET?

The only question is when this would materialise, with IMD's own wind-field projections indicating that it could get slightly delayed beyond the projected monsoon onset date of June 6 over Kerala.

The circulation is predicted to move along or just off the Kerala and Karnataka coasts, sustaining heavy rainfall even into the interior of the South Peninsula.

Over land, severe heat wave conditions are forecast over Rajasthan, Vidarbha and Madhya Pradesh during the next four days and over Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and South Uttar Pradesh during the next two days.

Heat wave to severe heat wave conditions may establish over the landmass, including the larger South-East Asia, due to the delay in the onset of the monsoon by up to a week this year.

But the heating of the landmass in this manner would only help deepen the sea-land temperature/ pressure differential (gradient), allowing the monsoon winds to blow directly into interior India.

The Arabian Sea arm of the monsoon would meet up with the Bay of Bengal over Central India later into June/ July, from where they would combine as one and run over the rest of the land by September.