The state of Kerala has seen flooding rains for quite some time now. So much so that the state reeled under the worst floods in the history of Kerala with rains refusing to take a backseat. In fact, hundreds of lives have been claimed and thousands to lakhs have been rendered homeless in the state of Kerala.
Until July 31, the state of Kerala had not seen mammoth rains and Monsoon remained within the normal range of 17 percent surplus between June 1 and July 31. However, by August 7, rains picked up by a massive amount and over 317 percent excess rains were seen during that time. On August 9, the state saw 150 percent excess rains.
Meanwhile, rainfall slightly reduced but it remained surplus for two days or so but these rans picked up again and continued for a long time. In fact, on August 15, 915 percent excess rains were observed while rains were at 775 percent excess.
Rains reduced on August 19 and flood situation started to ease out. In fact, during the last two days, rains have either ceased on some parts or remained light in nature on the other parts of the state of Kerala.
For the entire season now, Kerala has now seen 41 percent excess as on August 21. The state has recorded 2387 mm of rains against 1688 mm. In fact, Kerala after those mammoth rains has crossed the entire Monsoon season’s rain which is at 2040 mm. With 40 days to go, Kerala may be able to break a few rain records this time.
The month of August sees large variation in terms of rains for the state of Kerala. In the last seven years, the variation has been from 75 percent to -41 percent. It does not have any linkage with Pan India performance.
In fact, in 2014 August had 75 percent excess rains for Kerala while -9 percent for the entire country.
The state of Kerala has a coastline of 450 km with water on one side and mountains on the other. The state sees heavy rains and has natural slopes and water flows down right into the seas through the 44 rivers.
All but three of these rivers originate in the Western Ghats. 41 of these rivers flow westwards. Kerala rivers have small dimensions with the maximum being 254 km of Periyar River with the shortest being 16 km. These rivers originate from height and the flow is fast and carry volumes of water.
Two of these rivers go to Tamil Nadu and one goes to Karnataka and all these rivers join Kaveri. Thus, any heavy rains over Kerala become a challenge for Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
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Please Note: Any information picked from here must be attributed to skymetweather.com