Chennai may get more rain over two days – Times of India

Chennai News

CHENNAI: The surprise midnight spells in many core localities pushed the city’s performance to normal so far this July-September season, while also breaking a few rain records.
But will Nungambakkam station, which covers some central localities in the city, still short of 114.9mm rainfall this July-September season be able to recover the deficit? Mostly likely, said both meteorologists and bloggers. While weathermen have forecast light to moderate rain likely in the city in the next 48 hours, weather enthusiasts said the city has chances of another round of spells towards the end of the month after a brief dry spell.
The regional meteorological centre, Chennai has forecast, “The sky condition is likely to be generally cloudy. Light to moderate rain is likely to occur in some areas in the city for the next 48 hours. While the maximum and minimum temperatures would be around 31°C and 26°C in the next 24 hours, it is likely to be around 32°C and 26°C in the next 48 hours.”
The midnight rain left Nungambakkam with 57.3mm, which was the station’s 24-hour highest so far this year. The station, which has registered 274mm rainfall so far this July-September season, also crossed the previous lowest of 233mm in the 2009 season. The showers also pushed the 18% rain deficit in Chennai subdivision to reach the normal rainfall for the season with 384.1mm rainfall against a normal 386mm.
N Puviarasan, director, Area Cyclone Warning Centre, RMC, Chennai said the midnight spells that lasted well into early hours of Saturday was due several conditions like the east-west shear zone, between 3.1km and 4.2km height and a cyclonic circulation over southwest Bay of Bengal off North Tamil Nadu coast at 7.6km height. The shear zone which is the change of winds from easterlies to westerlies is a precursor to the formation of a low pressure. These conditions created a favourable wind pattern that converged closer to the coast bringing widespread rainfall.
“On Sunday, a cyclone from Thailand which has weakened is likely to move towards the Bay and form as a low pressure area over Northeast Bay Bengal on Sunday. Both the cyclonic circulation and the shear zone are likely to merge with the system. Due to this, we can expect rainfall here,” he said.
The IMD official said while Nungambakkam still holds a deficit, Meenambakkam has more than made up for it as it has so far registered 553.2mm this season with an excess of 125.2mm. This is mostly due to a weak westerlies or land breeze converging with strong easterlies or seabreeze about 20km to 30km into the land bringing rainfall in the outskirts of the city leaving the city core dry most of this season. City’s thirst quenching neighbours Kanchipuram has a 5% deficit with 392.3mm against a normal 413.6mm while Tiruvallur has a 7% excess with 425.3mm against 396mm.
“We have a chance for rainfall on Sunday and then we may have a break. We again have a chance in the last four days of the month when we get westerlies. This season, Chennai could go into excess with chances that Nungambakkam could achieve normal rainfall while Meenambakkam could even cross 600mm,” said Pradeep John, weather blogger.

Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chennai/chennai-may-get-more-rain-over-two-days/articleshow/78214012.cms