A tropical depression over the southwestern Bay of Bengal will gain tropical cyclone status as it makes its way west to the south coast of India.
Flooding rain and damaging winds will threaten parts of Sri Lanka and southeastern India along and near the path of this low.
Seas will be dangerous for fishing boats and other small vessels.
The estimated position of the low as of 1200 UTC Monday, Oct. 29, was about 180 miles east-southeast of Jaffna, Sri Lanka, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) indicated via its website.
Highest sustained winds were reckoned by the IMD to be at least 40 mph, which is at or above the minimal threshold for a tropical storm.
Movement of the low was slowly towards the west-southwest.
Tropical depression was centered east of northern Sri Lanka at the time of this 1300 UTC, Monday, Oct. 29, satellite image. (India Meteorological Department - IMD)
The IMD forecast this tropical low to veer northward, north of Sri Lanka, on Tuesday, then to cross the shore of Tamil Nadu state, south of Chennai, on Wednesday.
Given such a path, top rainfall in northern and western Sri Lanka to southeastern India would be 8 to 12 inches, enough to trigger serious flooding.
The months of October and November mark the height of the rainy season in this area. Rainfall during the last two weeks has left the ground saturated in some areas, which could magnify the impact of the heavy rain.
Monsoon Onset was June 13th, 2013, in Delhi, almost two weeks earlier than average. The June 15th onset at Karachi and Islamabad was more like three week ahead of schedule.
In Pakistan, hit-or-miss downpours missed the Sindh capital, Karachi. One did hit Pad Idan, where it left 60 mm of rain Wednesday. This was more than 20 times greater than the normal June rainfall.
It is still possible that this scenario is over wrought as to the intensity and spread of rain in Pakistan and northwestern India. However, it is the hunch of the present forecaster that some very unusual weather is going to unfold in the Subcontinent during the next week!
North of the expected Monsoon low, moist, rain-cooled air should flow northward to the Himalayas, even westward into the Indus Valley of Pakistan, the result being scattered downpours along with a break in the pre-Monsoon heat next week.
On Wednesday, June 5, 2013, the South West Monsoon was set to leap northward on the Indian Subcontinent by the middle of the month.
According to preliminary data not including the last three days of May, it was the coldest spring since 1962 and the fifth coldest since 1910, when comprehensive record keeping began in the U.K.
Jim Andrews
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