Flooding lingers in India as more tropical activity looms

After making landfall and tracking across the country, a tropical depression has redeveloped to the west of India. Meanwhile, more tropical activity may be in store over the Bay of Bengal.

On Friday, the tropical low that had been traversing across central India re-emerged over water, this time in the Arabian Sea.

Now no longer over land, and instead over the warm waters of the sea and in an area of light wind shear, this low reorganized into a tropical depression on Saturday, local time, despite the dry air present in the area.

This storm kept areas of rain and thunderstorms as well as gusty winds across Gujarat and parts of northern Maharashtra through Sunday. But the dry air across the region kept tropical downpours more widely separated.

While storms can bring localized flooding to the region, the main impact will be rough seas along India's west coast.

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"A general track to the west is expected, and depending on how strong the system can get, it could eventually near the southern Arabian Peninsula this week," said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Adam Douty.

This depression initially formed in the Andaman Sea over the weekend after some energy from former Tropical Storm Linfa moved into the region. By the end of the weekend, the storm moved into the Bay of Bengal and had strengthened into a deep depression.

The tropical depression made landfall in India around 7 a.m. local time on Tuesday, just north of the city of Kakinada. With sustained wind speeds of around 56 km/h (35 mph), the deep depression is equivalent to a tropical storm on the Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale.

After making landfall in eastern India on Tuesday, the deep depression continued to bring tropical rainfall across the center of the country through the middle of the week.

People stand by the side of a street inundated with floodwaters after heavy rainfall in Hyderabad, India, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2020. Record rains and heavy flooding in the southern Indian state of Telangana collapsed houses and killed more than a dozen people, police said Wednesday. (AP Photo/Mahesh Kumar A.)

As the depression approached land on Monday and Monday night, it doused the coastline with heavy, tropical rainfall, including some major cities on India's eastern shores.

"In just 24 hours, the city of Kakinada reported 261 mm (10.28 inches) of rain as of Tuesday morning. Visakhapatnam's total during the same time frame was 227 mm (8.94 inches)," said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Mike Doll.

According to the India Meteorological Department, Hyderabad recorded 250 mm (10 inches) of rainfall in just 24 hours on Tuesday, the highest in over 20 years.

By late Thursday morning, cities like Pune and Gulbarga reported over 120 mm (4.7 inches) of rainfall in just 24 hours time. Hyderabad had another day of more than 200 mm (10 inches) of rain during that time.

In Hyderabad, torrential rain has produced flooding and led to the collapse of walls and buildings across the city. At least 14 people were killed on Tuesday night after two individual houses collapsed. According to Al Jazeera, 18 people have died in the city since Monday.

Authorities declared a holiday on Wednesday and Thursday and encouraged residents to stay home and avoid traveling in the flooded streets.

This may not be the only area to watch for tropical development into next week.

Nangka, which made landfall over northern Vietnam as a tropical storm on Wednesday, is forecast to drift across Indochina into next week. Any energy that survives the trek over the mountainous region may aid in the development of a tropical system after emerging over the Bay of Bengal.

Whether or not an organized tropical system develops, another round of rain may be in store for parts of India.

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