After much speculations, country’s nodal agency Indian Meteorological Department has finally announced the onset of Southwest Monsoon over Kerala on June 8.
The Northern Limit of Monsoon (NLM) is now passing through Latitude 12°N/ Longitude 60°E, Latitude 12°N/ Longitude 70°E, Kannur, Chennai, Latitude 14°N / Longitude 84°E, Latitude 17°N / Longitude 92°E, Latitude 18°N / Longitude 94°E.
All the major criteria for the arrival of Monsoon including rainfall, speed and direction of wind, and depth of westerlies have also been met. However, OLR (Outgoing Longwave Radiation) still continues to be on borderline at 200 Wm-2 and 240 Wm-2 on June 7 and June 6, respectively.
The notebook criteria states that OLR needs to settle below 200 Wm-2 for two consecutive days. Thus on official day declaration, the OLR still continues to evade the required figure.
Skymet Weather had always been of opinion that Monsoon had reached India timely during the last few days of May itself.
All the above-mentioned criteria had also met during that time period. In fact, the OLR had even plunged to as low as 189 on May 27 but had slightly increased to 212 on May 28.
Moreover, the ongoing heavy showers can be touted as the second spell of the month. Heavy to extremely heavy rains had been lashing Kerala and Coastal since May 26. Though there was a dip for on June 3 and June 4 but rains have once again picked up again June 5 onwards.
The table below will give you a fair idea about the ongoing rainfall across the 14 pre-decided stations that dictate the onset of Monsoon over Indian mainland. The rainfall criteria for Monsoon is met when 2.5 mm of rain is recorded for two consecutive days in over 60 percent of these stations.
Monsoon forecast
According to Skymet Weather, we expect Monsoon surge to gain further strength, leading to the rapid advancement of Southwest Monsoon into some parts of the country.
Even after the official delay by good eight days, Monsoon is likely to reach Mumbai in a span of next 3-4 days.
It may not follow the same path thereafter and we may see the progress of Monsoon getting sluggish. However, there is nothing to worry about as waxing and waning of the Monsoon is completely normal which keeps taking place at regular interval.
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