Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Mumbai March Analysis by Rohit Aroskar on Stats and Analysis Page
How Cold Europe Was in March 2013...check here (Jim's Report)



Seems the further east ovr Europe, the more severe March 13 has been. Coldest for 51 yrs (UK), coldest in 60 yrs (Moscow). US can't compete.
The last time March was colder than December, January and February in Britain was back in 1975 according to the Met Office.
UK Experiences Coldest Easter Sunday On Record...Mark's Reports



Just up.. Next few Days  Sub-Continent Forecast and March Review on Current Weather Page..

Deadly floods hit Mauritius capital Port Louis on Saturday: The island's metereologists said 152mm (6in) of rain fell in less than an hour, 70mm less than the March average.

A related article in SANDRP
South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People is interesting and reproduced with their permission here..worth reading...


What is a Drought Year ? With 7.6% Deficient (All India), would 2012 be termed as a drought Year ?

Droughts in India has resulted in tens of millions of deaths over the course of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. Indian agriculture is heavily dependent on the Monsoons in India: a favorable southwest summer monsoon is critical in securing water for irrigating Indian crops. 
Some of the major drought-prone regions are southern and eastern Maharashtra, northern Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Gujarat, Bengal, Bihar and Rajasthan.

But why has this been repeatedly happening since the last 200 years? 200 years is a long enough period given to overcome the situation and prevent the people's suffering by providing adequate means and inter regional water storage and transfer.

And knowing the weather, it is almost natural, that either of the above mentioned regions is bound to get below normal deficient rainfall in any year. Do we literally have to wait for a surplus rainfall in each and every region of the country. If yes, than thats poor management and governance of water resources.  
We should be capable with providing the shortfall by the excess available in some other region. Nature's bounty is always merciful on us, but are we ever ready? 
Do we know how to store and preserve water, rather than just let it drain in the two seas on either side. Most of the SWM rains drain off in the seas.

Is India really water starved ? This article ( July 2012) published in Vagaries is most apt and suited for the topic under discussion....and the article ended with ..otherwise .....Otherwise we see the same old story in parts of the country today.  


Then what is a drought Year ?
Out of the total 36 meteorological subdivisions, 23 subdivisions constituting 67.3% of the total area of the country received excess/normal season rainfall and the remaining 13 subdivisions (32.7% of the total area of the country) received deficient season rainfall.

To really analyse the "drought" situation this year, let us take into consideration of the five Peninsula  states... TN, Kerala, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnataka, which, the officials tell us are the worst effected...


Karnataka: End Season, Coastal Karnatak was 0%, N.I.Karnataka was -36% and S.I.Karnataka was -23%.
Average deficiency for the state: -19.6%.

Maharashtra: End Season: Konkan -3%, Madhya Maharashtra -25%, Marathwada -33% and Vidharbha +8%.
Average State deficiency: -17.6%

Gujarat: Saurashtra and Kutch:-34%, Gujarat Region: -28%.
Average State deficiency: -31%.

Tamil Nadu State Deficiency: -23%. And Kerala -24%.

It can be noticed, from the above figures and map, that the drought regions are all "linked " to each other North/South. Providing and implementing the waters from the coastal regions to the interiors would have been a boon and would have mitigated the losses.

The severest amongst them is Gujarat. However, Gujarat has somewhat marginally lessened the woes by diverting the river waters to water starved Saurashtra and Kutch. Remember, Saurashtra by itself is deficient by -43% !

Maharashtra reservoirs are showing levels as follows as per latest levels available..
Konkan Reservoirs 55%full (last year at this date 49%), Marathwada  10% (24%), Nagpur  37% (35%), Pune 35% (39%).
Overall Maharastra Reservoirs: 32% (36% in 2012 and 50% in 2011).
Situation is manageable and could be kept under control.

Now, in the modern day and era, we have to consider the average of all the regions. The overall Monsoon performance is taken considering India as a whole..Excess and deficient regions. Any developing and established nation like ours would have considered the excess rains that its coastal/mountainous belt gets, to divert the huge amounts of water to its interiors. 
The coastal regions of Maharashtra and Karnataka get between 2000-6000 mms, and a few places even boast of over 7500-8000 mms as normal..now that's a fantastic amount of rain by any standards.
Maharashtra has Mahableshwar with five rivers running and originating from there, and from Nasik district the state has the Godavri river, running through the water starved regions of Marathwada !

The State has ample scope to put things in perspective, by irrigating the "normally" low rainfall regions. The state would never complain of a water scarcity !!

33 comments:

Unknown said...

RAJESH SIR, -VERY GOOD NOTE ON SAVING WATER AND HOW TO UTILISE IT IN PROPER WAY, ALSO YOU HAVE HIGHLIGHTED HOW WE CAN SAVE WATER AS OUR RAIN WATER GETS WASTED ,DRAINED BACK TO THE SEA, WE CAN EASILY SEE THESE THINGS HAPPENING IN MUMBAI ITSELF, EVEN THOUGH MUMBAI DURING GOOD MONSOON YEARS RECEIVES 3300 MM RAINS MOST OF IT IS WASTED ,EVEN THOUGH MUMBAI IS BLESSED WITH BOUNTIFUL RAINS , IT IS SAD TO SEE WE HAVE LESS RESOURCES TO PRESERVE WATER.AND IF THIS YEAR TURNS OUT TO BE A GOOD MONSOON YEAR 2013, WILL THERE BE INITIATIVE STEPS TAKEN BY OUR GOVERGOVERMENT MENT TO SAVE WATER LOOKING AT LAST YEARS SITUATION ? WELL THATS WHAT IT IS A BIG QUESTION MARK.ITS BEEN HAPPENING FOR YEARS .

Unknown said...

Rajesh sir -Point to be noted Maharashtra ( konkan )and karnataka on the west coast receive bountiful rains every year.in whole india except north eastern states. hope our goverment realises it sooner? the better.

Arpit Sharma said...

Here we are talking about drought and there the desert city of Rajasthan i.e. Jaisalmer got decent rain last night amounting upto 12.6 mm.So this is going to be a very good month for Rajasthan again as various places got good rainfall from previous 2 WDs too...lets hope for the best for other cities...

Tejas Baxi said...

Have you come across any solution to capture and divert the plentiful rainfall water from the konkan coastline to the high ghats? how can one economically transfer that amount of water, onto 500m high ghats?

Rajesh said...

Tejas: The heaviest rains are On the ghats..above the 500 mts mentioned by you..and the water from the ghats run down to the plauns on either side, sea side and inland..that is being stored, if you see the water running down the Krishna river from Mahableshwar...and more needs to be trapped and stored...what and where is the question of taking water back upwards ?
Thanks

Tejas Baxi said...

i assumed that the plentiful rain actually falls between the peaks of the ghat and the coast and anything east of the peaks is a rain shadow area. also the west face of the ghat is very steep so any water collection wud have to be somewhat below the ghat level.
thanks

Shitij said...

Problem of water crisis is becoming more critical day by day.Main reason behind this is the rapid growth of population.Conserving the water is not the main remedy for the problem of water crisis.Curbing the population growth is the main remedy for the problem of water crisis.Let us take an example.Assume that whole people of India start conserving water or if the water of all the rivers in India is diverted towards drought affected regions then it will ease the problem of water crisis say for 10 years or 20 years and after that this problem will arise again due to the rapid expansion of population.According to one estimate if the population of country continues to grow at an existing rate then population of India will become doubled after 20 years but demand for water will not get double instead it will increase by 3 times or even more than that due to the rapid industrialisation so I think that curbing population growth is the main remedy for the problem of water crisis.What's your views on this???

sset said...

Great analysis Rajesh Sir - Our agriculture/irrigation minister needs to be enlightened about this. Linking of rivers - benefits poor farmers and growing population. We should consult expertise from IIT/US/EU/private sectors like HCC,LT,REL for such projects.

In all respects MAHA is blessed with multiple rivers. but still people here say "drought"????

Myself feel RAJ/GUJ cannot be termed as drought prone (if we go by past 5 years stats). Deserts are dissappearing - rains over 400mm in 24hrs are common in jaisalmar areas. These places have become relatively cooler now.

But new areas of desertification have started in south India - Rayalseema, south east interior KAR / TN. Cities like BANG/MYSR are very near to Anantpur (one of the Indias hottest/driest spots) every risk of heat wave and expanding desert. Every time Anantpur/Rayalseema sizzeles at 45-50deg BANG end up with 39deg++.

Navi Mumbai suddenly become cloudy - looks like going to rain????

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

maharashtra had once followed the drip irrigation ('Thibak Sinchan' in marathi) technique of Israel ..the farmers of the western maha region benefited from it ..also th black soil of western maha region has good water retetntion capacity .. think localised solutions needed alongwith bigger projects..

Anonymous said...

good article on water resources : http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/facts%20about%20israel/land/focus%20on%20israel-%20development%20of%20limited%20water%20reso

Rajesh said...

Comments of Blog transfered to Current weather Page:

Atul : I don't think Arpil will be hotter for Panji but it will be more humid. So you can say muggy & sultry April.. on
Abhijit
at 5:48 PM

Here in Goa, March has been near normal for both max and min temps, except for the first week. Now looking forward to a hotter April.. on

Atul Naik
at 4:16 PM

yes rajesh sir...there was a thunderstorm yesterday night 20-30 km west of bangalore....no rain in the city though on
shankar kiran

Abhijit Modak said...

Max temp for 31/03/2013

Some Maha cities max temp for today :

Mumbai max temp for today :
Colaba 32c, Santacruz 33.8c

Nagpur 39c
Solapur 41c
Akola 40.1c
Aurangabad 37.4c
Pune 37c
Nashik 37c
Panji 33.3c
Ratnagiri 32.6c
Mahabaleshwar 32.8c

Delhi max temp for today :
S'Jung 31.5c, Palam 32.7c

Chennai max temp for today :
NGBKM 33.9c, MNBKM 34.8c

Kodaikanal 22c

Kolkata max temp for today : Alipore 34.6c, Dum Dum 35.6c

Rajkot max temp 37.4c & Surat max temp 36.6c for today.

Anonymous said...

March 2013 average temp for Mumbai SCZ : 34 / 19.3 , CLB max avg : 32.4

March 2013:
Min temp below 20 c at SCZ : 18 times,
Max temp below 32 c at SCZ: 10 times, Max temp above 35 c at SCZ : 8 times

At colaba , max temp below 32 c -18 times..max temp above 35 c- 5 times

Anonymous said...

Mar avg temp for SCZ decoded-
1-8 Mar (when high pressure ridge was sitting on Mumbai)- 38.9 / 17.2
9-31 Mar (after the ridge dissapeared) - 32.3 / 20.1

For CLB max avg.. 1-8 mar - 35.5 c .... 9-31 mar - 31.3 c

Anonymous said...

March 2013 at SCZ :

Lowest max temp:30.2 (13th March) , Highest max temp:40.5 (7th march)

Lowest min temp - 15.6 ( 4th,5th March) , Highest min temp-23.6 (25th mar)

Highest daily range - 23.9 (5th Mar) , Lowest daily range-9.6 (26th mar)

sset said...

Forcast of rain/thunder for BANG seems did not happen???? Fear is will 2014 repeat drought of 2013?? BANG missed pre-monsoon showers,extremely weak SWM and absence of NEM. It rained only 450mm for entire 2013.

Seems lots of clouds over south SriLanka (0deg latitude) - will this move north towards south India - provide much needed relief from relentless heat????

Rajesh said...

Thanks Rohit, nice analysis..
sset: A reader confirmed on this blog itself of thundershower in Bangalore...

Anonymous said...

Mar 2013 avg max temp of the cities in contest :

1.SCZ - 34 C .. 2. CLB -32.4 C ..3. PUNE - 35.5 ..4.RAJKOT-36.8 ..5. SFD -30.9 ..6.PLM - 31.4 .. 7. KOLKATA(ALP)-34.9 ..8.SURAT - 35.9 ..9.NAGPUR-36.9.10.CHENNAI(NG)-32.7 ..11.BANGALORE-33.9..12.KODAIKANAL-19.7 ..13.M'BALESWAR -30.4 ..14. SHIMLA -19.1..

Unknown said...

As rajesh sir forecasted bangalore city records 12.3 mm of rain..thunder and lightning was very deadly..other areas of bangalore got very heavy rainfall ...

Vijayanand said...

Nice rain in central and north bangalore last evening. South bangalore only witnessed drizzle. With this the year's rainfall has started.

Vijayanand said...

Heavy rain right now in south bangalore. Very heavy wind as well. After so many days of heat ...relief finally. Thank God :)

Anonymous said...

HAPPY APRIL FOOLS DAY ..

Unknown said...

Pre- monsoon showers. there is yet time for it ,it will start in by 1st week of May in south india, and is well associated with the monsoon clouds

Rajesh said...

sam khan: correct...and why dont you participate in contest ? You can put in your entries for April before 15th of the month...

Unknown said...

@ vijayanand ... bangalore city records tr and hal airport records just 3.2mm can u tell me where they are exactly located ...rains were mainly concentrated to south part of the city and both imd stations did not record much rains..

Vijayanand said...

@Shankar kiran,
It rained heavily in south bangalore areas of Jayanagar , JP Nagar and BTM layout last evening. I believe it must have been around 15mm to 20mm.

Vijayanand said...

@Shankar kiran,

HAl AP is central eastern part of the city. By Bangalore city, I guess they are referring to Palace road [central bangalore].
Wish we could have recordings from Jayanagar in south bangalore and also Electronic city in south eastern Bangalore.

Unknown said...

@ vijayanand...thank you.... i heard that it was raining heavily near indranagar and surrounding areas which is closer to hal airport but only 3.2mm that kept wondering me...i think they dont have a proper rain gauge

Vijayanand said...

Very warm and sultry start for the day in bangalore. Hope we get one more deluge today :)

Rajesh said...

Vijayanand/shankar: the observatory building is in the heart of the city..

Abhijit Modak said...

Some Maharashtra cities max temp for today :

Mumbai max temp:Santacruz 30.8c, Colaba & Vagaries 31c.

Pune 36c
Nagpur 39.4c
Solapur 40.2c
Akola 40.6c
Aurangabad 36.6c
Nashik 34.5c
Panji 33c
Ratnagiri 31.5c


Chennai max temp for today : NGBKM 33.4c, MNBKM 34c

Bangalore max temp 34.9c today

Kodaikanal max 21.8c today

Delhi S' Jung max temp for today : 36c

Rajkot max temp 35.7c & Surat max temp 33.8c for today.

Kolkata max temp for today : Alipore 36.9c, Dum Dum 37.4c

Abhijit Modak said...

Delhi Palam max temp for today is 37c

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