India's Extreme Weather Week 9

 Thunderstorms in India

Thunderstorms are common in the eastern and northeastern parts of India. Gangetic West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Orissa, and States in NE India get affected by severe thunderstorms during premonsoon months of March to May. They usually travel from northwest to southeast direction and are called “Norwesters”. The highest annual frequency (100-120 days) is observed over Assam and Sub Himalayan West Bengal in the east and Jammu region in the north. The lowest frequency (less than 5 days) is observed over Ladakh region. In the plains Gangetic West Bengal and Bangladesh record between 80 and 100 days of thunderstorm annually. In 2018 Dust packed high winds emanating from a huge severe thunderstorm complex tore down trees and damaged homes across north central India. At least 100 deaths were reported from the winds. Officials said that the action plan has both short-term and  long-term measures for mitigation of lightning in Kerala. despite warnings across all forms of media, including social media, there’s a general lack of caution among the public against lightning. 
People tend to be cautious of travelling when there’s a heavy rainfall. Kerala used to report an average of 71deaths due to lightning per year. Most such cases are reported in the pre monsoon months of April and march and those accompanying the northeast monsoon in Oct-Dec. The Mitigation plan is all government buildings should be checked for lightning resistance and new constructions should be lightning-resistant. Lightning protectors should be installed on all buildings mostly on the tall buildings. An early lightning alert system should be put in place so that warnings will go out one hour before and lightning monitoring cell should be set up.






References
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/fierce-thunderstorm-related-winds-kill-more-100-india
https://incois.gov.in/documents/ITCOocean/OITC018/L6Part-II-Thunderstorm_Naresh%20Kumar.pdf
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kochi/plan-to-mitigate-lightning-hazard-remains-on-paper/articleshow/90753999.cms


Comments

  1. jwlylApril 5, 2023 at 7:59 PM

    HI Angie,
    Wow! It looks like thunderstorms in India are devastating. The video of the dust storm was enlightening too, thank you for posting that! It is important that there are mitigation plans in place and it is interesting to learn about them from your post. The thunderstorms in Iceland are not as devastating, although they do have them frequently. Thank you for your well done post, I learned a lot!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ana GGApril 10, 2023 at 9:13 AM

    Very interesting read!

    ReplyDelete

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