Mumbai: The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has revised its district rain forecast and issued a yellow alert till Thursday, with the possibility of heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places on Wednesday in Mumbai, Thane and Palghar. However, IMD officials said these may just be short, heavy bursts of rain, as opposed to continuous, heavy downpours or extremely heavy rain.
KS Hosalikar, deputy director general, western region, IMD, said on Sunday, rain was intensified by the westerly to southwesterly winds pushing frequent cloud bands over the north Konkan coast, including Mumbai. Because of this, a yellow alert has been issued until Thursday. “Monsoon conditions are likely to further intensify in the coming days, with the possibility of heavy to very heavy rain on Tuesday and Wednesday,” he said.
Mumbai has received 1,085.4mm rainfall from June 1 to July 12 (5.30pm), 47 per cent of its seasonal target. The city’s seasonal average rainfall is 2,317.1mm. The suburbs and south Mumbai recorded 23 per cent and 22 per cent excess rainfall respectively, in the same period.
IMD officials said the monsoon would be active once more in Mumbai from July 15, with heavy, widespread rain possible around July 17. “The city can expect mostly moderate showers (40-50 mm for 24-hours per day over the next three days), with some places witnessing short spells of heavy rains till July 15. These showers won’t cause much inconvenience. These are likely to be short 15-20 minutes heavy bursts and that too only in isolated areas, and not widespread. Monsoon is still in a mini-break phase over north Konkan,” Hosalikar said.
Rain or not, the maximum and minimum temperatures in the city hovered around 28 and 24 degrees Celsius, with a relative humidity of 93 per cent being recorded at the Colaba and Santacruz observatories respectively.
