Southwest monsoon sets in South Andaman sea

Agartala, May 18 (UNI) The southwest monsoon has already set in over South Andaman sea, almost a week earlier than normal an Indian Meteoroloical Department (IMD) report said today but did not suggest an early monsoon over eastern and northern parts of the country.

Meanwhile, quoting the National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting(NCMRWF), Indian Council of Agricultural Research(ICAR), the Agro-meteorology(AAS) Tripura division said the weather till May 21 was going to be partly cloudy and light rain might occur in a few places over the northeast.

Wind speed was expected to be normal, mostly southwesterly with the average speed of three to five metres per hour. Day and night temperatures were expected to remain unchanged--varying from 32 to 34 and 23 to 25 degrees Celsius respectively.

The forecast model suggested that the monsoon onset over Kerala was likely to be on May 24, with a model error of + - 3 days.

However, the onset of monsoon over Tripura and a few states of Northeast was expected to be May 25 to June one.

The long-term mean date of monsoon onset over Kerala is June 1, which has a standard deviation of about a week. Normally monsoon covers the entire country by July 15.

The earliest onset of monsoon over Kerala was on May 14, 1960 and the most delayed onset was on June 18, 1972 during the past 50 years, weather records of ICAR, Agro-meteorology indicated.

UNI