The month of November has a record of hosting maximum tropical storms during the post monsoon season. The Bay of Bengal is a preferred basin to churn out more number of cyclones than the Arabian Sea. October has already witnessed two storms, Tej and Hamoon, one each over the Indian Seas. Both these storms spared the Indian coastline and headed for Yemen and Bangladesh respectively.
In the last 10 years, from 2013 to 2022, Bay of Bengal has stirred 18 tropical storms, as against 10 in the Arabian Sea, during post monsoon season. Precariously, last 2 years, no storm formed in the month of November over the Indian Seas. As such, 2021 & 2022 put together hosted just 5 storms during the post monsoon but Bay of Bengal claimed a much bigger share of 4 and Arabian Sea, mere 1 storm, in October 2021.
During last 10 years, Bay of Bengal has generated 7 storms in November and Arabian Sea lagging behind with only 4 tropical cyclones. Frequency of storms in the Arabian Sea drops sharply in December as compared to Bay of Bengal. It has hosted only one storm ‘Pawan’ in December 2019, and that too was far from the Indian coast in the western parts of the Arabian Sea. There were two hasty storms, Gulab and Vardah, which traversed across both the oceans in 2021 and 2016 respectively.
Northeast monsoon has remained rather mild since its onset on 21stOctober. The activity has picked up in the past 24hr and likely to continue for the next few days. However, there is no major perturbation embedded in the seasonal northeasterly stream moving across southern parts of Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea. Accordingly, there is no storm likely to come up during first half of November. Climatological probability remains high for development of such weather system during 2nd half of November, and more so over Bay of Bengal.
