Very Severe Cyclone Fani to hit Odisha coast by May 3, torrential rains and damaging winds likely

It seems that the suspense around the landfall of very severe cyclone Fani is finally coming to an end. After ruling out Tamil Nadu and Bangladesh, Fani would be now heading towards Odisha coast.

At present, cyclonic storm Fani is sustaining a strength of very severe cyclone, centered at latitude 11.7°N and longitude 86.5°E, about 650 km east-northeast of Trincomalee, Sri Lanka, 680 km east-southeast of Chennai, Tamil Nadu and 750 km southeast of Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh.

The system would change its track and would now move in northwest direction. According to weathermen, Cyclone Fani would be most powerful when it would abeam Kavali, Andhra Pradesh. It would be during this time, when the severe cyclonic storm Fani would turn into extremely severe cyclone by May 1-2.

Thereafter, it is likely to recurve in north-northeast direction. Thus, because of the orientation of the India coast, it would be very difficult for the tropical storm Fani to avoid Odisha.

Fani is most likely to make landfall in Odisha near Gopalpur, Paradip and Puri around evening of May 3.

According to Skymet Weather, Cyclone Fani would hit the coast as extremely severe cyclone. In wake of this, Odisha would be now bracing for extremely heavy rains and thundershowers all along the south coastal areas. It would also be accompanied with high velocity winds to the tune of 150 kmph, gusting up to 190 kmph - 200 kmph. Besides this, intense lightning strikes and thunderstorms would also strike Odisha.

Sea conditions would rough to very rough from May 1-3, with some high sea tides ranging from 8 feet to 12 feet. Some places could see sea waves rising as high as 15 feet or 16 feet.

NDRF (National Disaster Response Force), National Crisis Management Committee, and Navy are already on alert. Around 879 multipurpose cyclone shelters are also ready for the rescue operation.

May 2: Heavy to very rains are expected to lash south coastal districts of Odisha such as Malkangiri Koraput, Rayagada, Gajapati, Ganjam, Khurda and Puri.

May 3: Intensity and the spread of rains would increase manifolds. We expect most parts of Odisha to get heavy rains heavy to extremely heavy rains. Coastal areas like Balasore, Bhadrak, Kendrapara and Puri, Ganjam Gajapati, Kandhamal Kalahandi Ongole and Keonjhargarh would all see torrential rains.  Meanwhile, we can expect light to moderate rains over rest parts of Odisha.

May 4: By this time, cyclonic storm Fani would start moving north towards Gangetic West Bengal and Bangladesh. Thus, weather over Odisha will improve but light to moderate rains would continue.

Image Credit:en.wikipedia.org

Any information taken from here should be credited to skymetweather.com