Red alert for Mumbai, Thane, Palghar, Raigad

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The India Meteorological Department (IMD) on Wednesday updated its forecast and issued a ‘red alert’ warning for Mumbai, Thane, Palghar and Raigad and said more than 200mm of rain is expected over the next 24 hours.

The heavy rains, which continued to lash Mumbai for the second day on Wednesday, prompted authorities to shut down schools in the city as commuters faced traffic snarls and slow trains during the morning rush hour.

“In wake of IMD’s warning of heavy rainfall for the rest of the day, schools shall remain closed today. Principals of schools, where students are already in, are requested to take precautions and ensure that they are sent back home carefully and safely,” a spokesperson of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said, according to news agency ANI.

The city and its suburbs witnessed incessant rainfall from Monday night through to Wednesday morning. The intensity of rain reduced marginally during the day on Tuesday but resumed towards the evening. The weather bureau has predicted heavy rain with intermittent spells of very heavy rain in isolated areas for the next four days.

South Mumbai recorded more rain than the suburbs over the last 24 hours. Colaba weather observatory recorded 122mm while Santacruz recorded 118.3mm during this time. Thane recorded 173mm, Palghar 192mm, Dahanu 100.1mm, Harnai 115.3mm, Alibaug 93mm, and most areas within the Mumbai Metropolitan Region recorded rainfall above 100mm over the last 24 hours.

From 8.30am on Monday to 8.30am on Tuesday, Mumbai suburbs had recorded 130.4mm of rain while south Mumbai recorded 80mm.

The weather bureau categorises rainfall above 64.4mm in a 24-hour period as ‘heavy’, and between 115.6mm to 204.4mm as ‘very heavy’.

“There are currently four weather factors leading to intense widespread rainfall over Mumbai, Thane, Raigad and Panvel,” KS Hosalikar, IMD’s deputy director-general (western region), said.

“A low-pressure area over the Odisha coast which has intensified monsoon conditions along the west coast combined with two cyclonic circulations – one over the northeast Arabian Sea and one over central India. Lastly, an easy west wind sheer is further enhancing westerly winds leading to heavy rain,” Hosalikar said.

Several trains were terminated, reversed or suspended after waterlogging was reported at stations like Vasai and Virar. Local train services on the fast railway line on Central Railway between Kurla and Matunga were suspended from 11.30am. Slow train services were running but with a delay of up to 30 minutes, officials said.

“Due to continuous heavy rains and water-logging between Vikhroli-Kanjurmarg, services on all six lines (slow, fast, fifth and sixth lines) have been stopped. Our team is assessing the situation for the resumption of services as early as possible. Services are running between Thane-Kasara/Karjat,” the Central Railway said.

The heavy rains also caused minor flight delays at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International (CSMI) Airport.

Traffic police said a jam was reported on the Western Express Highway from Carnival Cinema at Borivali East to JVLR junction in the morning making it difficult for commuters to reach their office on time as the estimated travel time was more than two hours.

Mumbai has witnessed heavy to very heavy rain spells during the first week in the past three months, which helped the city surpass its seasonal and annual average rainfall.

Apart from rain over the past 48 hours, three spells of extremely heavy rain days this monsoon included – July 1 and 2 when 375.2mm was recorded in 24 hours, 219.2mm from July 26 to July 27, and 204mm between August 3 and 4 – all identified as ‘extreme rainfall’ events.

Mumbai has so far recorded 2,865.3mm of rain since the beginning of the season and the weather bureau expects the city will surpass the 3,000mm mark by the end of the week as more rain has been predicted.

Independent meteorologists said the rain intensity was likely to reduce from Friday.

“There is a low-pressure system over the northern part of the Bay of Bengal and a weaker low-pressure over the northern part of the Arabian Sea. In addition, the off-shore trough is active leading to rainfall enhancement in MMR since early Tuesday,” meteorologist Akshay Deoras said.

“Intermittent showers will continue in this week with isolated spells of heavy showers,” Deoras, who is also a PhD researcher at the UK’s University of Reading, added.