IMD predicts moderate to heavy rain, thunderstorms in Delhi today

NEW DELHI: The weather in the city remained humid and cloudy on Monday, even as the weather department expected heavy showers across the city.
The weather department had initially issued an orange alert for heavy rain on Monday but withdrew the forecast in the morning. But it reinstated the forecast in the evening, only to withdraw it again.
Meanwhile, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) announced plans to improve forecasts by adding three more Doppler weather radars in the region.Currently, there are three radars in the city.
The IMD’s forecast for Monday, similar to Sunday’s, failed as it predicted moderate to heavy rain, but the actual rainfall that day was nil. On Friday, June 28, an underestimated forecast by IMD caught the city by surprise with the arrival of the monsoon and a devastating deluge. The city recorded 228.1 mm of rainfall in a matter of hours.
Dr Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, director general of meteorology at IMD, told media on Monday that the highest hourly rainfall of 91 mm in an hour, between 5 am and 6 am, was “challenging to predict” and that the rainfall received on Friday was “almost a cloudburst”.
To qualify as a cloudburst, at least 100 mm of rainfall per hour is required. Mohapatra mentioned plans to improve local forecasts by installing three more radars.
“The extremely heavy rainfall was confined to a very small part of the city, though heavy rainfall occurred at many places. None of the areas of the city on June 28 recorded an hourly rainfall of more than 100 mm. It was thus a near cloudburst but not a cloudburst by definition. The recorded hourly rainfall was maximum at 91 mm between 5 am and 6 am on June 28 over Safdarjung,” Mohapatra said.
According to IMD, which shared hourly rainfall data for Delhi University and Lodhi Road, the highest hourly rainfall measured on June 28 was 91 mm between 5 am and 6 am at DU, while on Lodhi Road, 89 mm of rainfall was recorded at the same time. IMD further noted that the maximum rainfall in 24 hours for Delhi in June was 235.5 mm on June 24, 1936.
On June 28, there was a rainfall of 228.1 mm, the second highest recorded for June and the third highest overall for the June to August period.
Meanwhile, the city recorded a maximum temperature of 36 degrees Celsius on Monday, which was a degree below normal compared to 37.1 degrees Celsius a day earlier. The minimum temperature on Monday was 28.4 degrees Celsius, a degree above normal, compared to 27 degrees Celsius on Sunday. Humidity levels ranged from 59% to 82%.
Maximum and minimum temperatures on Tuesday are likely to hover around 33 and 27 degrees Celsius, respectively.
IMD expects moderate to heavy rain on Tuesday and Wednesday, accompanied by thunderstorms, lightning, and gusty winds reaching 30-40 kmph.