After surplus monsoon, more rain expected in Goa

PANAJI: An exceptionally good monsoon season ended for Goa with a total of 3,900mm rainfall and a 33% surplus, but there has hardly been a respite in the post monsoon season in the rain-drenched state as the surplus has now touched an identical figure, as per the records till Sunday.
For the three-month period of October to December, while a total of 200.1mm rainfall is normal, the total post-monsoon rainfall this season has already touched 170.1mm – a surplus of 33%.A total of 128mm rain would be normal up to the current October period. Over the last five years, this is the highest post-monsoon total so far for Goa.
In 2014, meteorologists had recorded 310.2mm for the entire October-December quarter with a surplus of 55%. There have barely been five dry days of the 20 days up until now this October. Now, the India meteorological department (IMD), Panaji has forecast heavy rainfall in isolated places for another four days from Wednesday, October 23 to Friday, October 25, 2019.
“This is due to low pressure area over east-central Arabian Sea,” said director IMD, Panaji, Krishnamurty Padgalwar.
M R Ramesh Kumar, meteorologist (retired) national institute of oceanography (NIO), said the shift in rainfall pattern is evident. “In earlier decades, monsoon would peter out towards end of August and tourists would flock to Goa by September or October,” he said.
But this season, drought-like conditions in June and flood conditions towards later part of the season typified weather in Goa and also the subcontinent.
“The rainfall in July, August and September more than compensated the deficit, which is an interesting feature,” Kumar said.
The rainfall quota of 702.3mm in August was achieved within a fortnight while 305.8mm of rain in September was surpassed within five days.
“This can be attributed to positive phase of Indian ocean dipole mode – the warming of sea surface temperatures in western equatorial Indian ocean and cooling in the eastern equatorial Indian ocean. This warming helps facilitates more moisture transport into peninsular India,” the NIO scientist said.