US forecaster puts South India on flood alert

The monsoon has beat forecasts to advance into Mumbai on Friday, which means the seasonal rains have cut down the ‘onset phase lag' to just one day.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) said that the monsoon has since covered more parts of central Arabian Sea, most parts of Konkan, Madhya Maharashtra including Pune, parts of Marathwada, most of Karnataka and entire Rayalaseema.


WIDE COVERAGE
The rains have also marched into parts of Telangana, coastal Andhra Pradesh, most parts of west-central Bay of Bengal and parts of the north Bay.
The northern limit of monsoon passed through Mumbai, Pune, Osmanabad, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Agartala, Dhubri and Gangtok on Friday.
The IMD said conditions are favourable for further advance into remaining parts of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh and southern parts of Gujarat, Chhattisgarh and Orissa during the next four days.
The strong revival of the monsoon over the past couple of days is being attributed to the low-pressure area staying put over the west-central Bay. The longer it stay in the waters, the stronger the flows would be.
The department said the monsoon flow over Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal would further intensify during the next three days.


FLOOD ALERT
The International Research Institute (IRI) of Climate and Society at Columbia University has issued a flood warning for most of the southern peninsular over the six-day-period ending mid-week next week.
A related outlook from IMD valid for the next two days said that isolated heavy rainfall would occur over the North-East, Konkan, Goa, coastal Karnataka, Kerala and Lakshadweep, south coastal Andhra Pradesh and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
The IRI warning said that floods associated with heavy to very heavy rainfall ‘anytime during this period.'
North Kerala and adjoining coastal Karnataka could turn the ‘wettest spots' with some exceptionally heavy rainfall being forecast over these regions.
The US-based forecaster said that floods are possible over the north Kerala and coastal Karnataka coasts; south Konkan; north and south interior Karnataka; contiguous north and coastal Tamil Nadu; and south coastal Andhra Pradesh.

HEAVY RAINS
Heavy to very heavy rains are possible over north Kerala and adjoining south interior Karnataka; eastern parts of north interior Karnataka; and west Rayalaseema.
In this manner, wetter than normal conditions are forecast over entire southern peninsula, becoming less wet to the north; head Bay of Bengal and the Kolkata region but tapering off in intensity into adjoining east-central and central India.




Meanwhile, the US National Centres for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) said that the Bay ‘low' would cross the south coastal Andhra Pradesh-north Tamil Nadu coast on Saturday.
It is shown to immediately trigger the formation of a counterpart system across the peninsula in the Arabian Sea off the Konkan coast.
The strong Arabian Sea flows would put the system on a track to the north; the NCEP said on Friday that this track would take it directly over Mumbai-Gujarat by June 15.
From here, the system would keep tracking further to the north into northwest India after traversing entire Gujarat, southwest Rajasthan before turning northeast to sit over east Rajasthan by June 17 up to which forecasts were available.
An IMD outlook until Sunday said that widespread rain or thundershowers would occur over Kerala, Lakshadweep, coastal Karnataka, Konkan and Goa.
Fairly widespread rain or thundershowers are likely over south interior Karnataka, south Madhya Maharashtra, coastal Andhra Pradesh, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, the North-East and Rayalaseema.
In its short-to-medium term outlook valid until June 15, the IMD said that the rainfall activity would further along west coast, south Gujarat and over the North-East