3 days ago
Deep depression triggers Kol showers, brace for rainy Friday
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Kolkata: A deep depression that crossed over to the land near Sagar Island on Thursday triggered moderate rain in Kolkata. The Alipore weather office recorded 15.5 mm rainfall till Thursday night.
Met officials said the system is likely to trigger more rain till Friday afternoon. While this weather system accelerated the monsoon's arrival in North Bengal on Thursday, six days in advance, Met officials have yet to forecast monsoon's date with Kolkata.
The city woke up to a mostly sunny morning, with cloud cover in between. But clouds from the deep depression system started reaching the city sky when it began crossing the land between 10.30 am and 11.30 am, triggering widespread showers.
Although the prediction for the city was heavy rain till late night, the rain amount remained moderate. However, Met officials have not ruled out rain till Friday afternoon with squally wind at night.
The rain also dragged the maximum temperature to 29.7°C, 5.4 notches below normal and the lowest this month. The minimum was 25.8°C,1.4°C below normal.
"Moving at 22 kmph, the deep depression crossed land between Sagar Island and Khepupara at a distance of 40 km southwest of Canning, 130 km west-southwest of Mongla, and 190 km west of Khepupara," said Somnath Dutta, head of Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC), Kolkata.
The system's speed slowed to 5 kmph as it moved northeastwards. Till reports came in last, the system was close to Canning and was about 100 km west-southwest of Mongla. "This system will continue to trigger more rain in almost all parts of Bengal in the next few days," said Dutta.
The system is likely to rescind into a depression by Friday morning and then become a well-marked low-pressure area by Saturday. Met officials said the window for an intense shower in Kolkata was Thursday and Friday afternoon.
Met officials said they are keeping tabs on this system that could affect monsoon reaching the city in about three days. The normal monsoon arrival date in North Bengal is June 5, while it is June 10 for parts of South Bengal, including Kolkata.
"Monsoon has covered Alipurduar, Cooch Behar, Jaipaiguri, Darjeeling and Kalimpong. Conditions are favourable for the further advance of southwest monsoon over some more parts of Bengal in the next couple of days," said H R Biswas, head of the weather forecast section at RMC.
