Southwest Monsoon 2019 rainfall average is ‘normal’

Cleaning up operation at a flood-hit house near Sreekantapuram in Kannur.

India has received an average rainfall of 558 mm in the 2019 monsoon season till Monday.

This is neither below nor above the Long Period Average (LPA); in other words, the deviation from normal rainfall is exactly 0%. Considering that the rainfall was 33% deficient at the end of June, the monsoon has intensified rapidly. But, inter-State variations exist.

The scatter plot below charts actual rainfall against the percentage of deviation from LPA across States as of Monday. States above the horizontal zero line received more rainfall than usual — the higher they are, the more the deviation from normal (LPA). The States below the line received lesser rainfall than usual.

 

Despite floods in many parts of the State, Kerala has still received deficient rains compared to LPA and 86% of its districts have recorded normal rainfall.

The table below shows the percentage of districts in each State across rainfall categories. For instance, 10% districts in Punjab had “large excess” (LE) rainfall while 40% had “deficient” (D) rainfall.

Shades of blue indicate more rainfall than normal, while shades of red indicate lesser rainfall than average.

LD : Largely deficient (-60% to -99% of Long Period Average rainfall)

D : Deficient (-20% to -59% of LPA)

N : Normal rainfall (-19% to +19% of LPA)

E : Excess (+20% +59% of LPA)

LE : Large excess (>59% of LPA)