The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has begun issuing block-level weather forecast in the State as part of introducing weather alerts that are more localised.
The IMD Meteorological Centre, Thiruvananthapuram, issues the forecast for a five-day period.
A typical block-level forecast covers the rainfall, maximum and minimum temperatures, humidity, wind speed and direction and cloud cover for the next five days.
Kerala regions aside, the IMD is providing the forecasts for Kavaratti, Agatti, Amini, Andrott, Chetlat, Kadmat, Kalpeni, Kiltan and Minicoy in the Lakshadweep Islands.
District level too
The weather agency is also working on a proposal for issuing ‘impact-based’ forecasts at the district level, K. Santhosh, Director, IMD Meteorological Centre, told The Hindu .
The IMD had for the first time introduced impact-based forecasts for Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi cities in 2020.
An impact-based forecast for heavy rainfall carries such details as realised weather, a three-hour forecast and the ‘impact’ — such as waterlogging on major roads, uprooting of trees and floods.
Typically, the forecast is accompanied by suggestions on precautionary measures.
At present, the IMD has 30 automatic weather stations (AWS) and 29 automatic rain gauges (ARG) in Kerala.
In 2020, the IMD had come in for criticism from the State for being ill-equipped to provide localised alerts.
More AWS
Since then, it has added more AWS to the list in Kerala. But the effort has also been hit by delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the fact that some of the sites identified for the purpose have not met the IMD standards.
