Barely a week after Chennai’s city areas and suburbs were flooded, heavy rain lashed the southern parts of Tamil Nadu, with Kayalpattinam in Thoothukudi district recording an overwhelming 95 cm rainfall in the last 24 hours, IMD officials said Monday.
The weather conditions have intensified ever since the ongoing northeast monsoon became active over the state late last week, prompting the authorities to issue alerts and carry out rescue operations in the affected areas.
Overall, according to the Regional Meteorological Centre in Chennai, the state has received 44 cm rainfall since October 1, exceeding the average Northeast monsoon season by 5%.
“The northeast monsoon continues to be vigorous over southern Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Extremely to exceptionally heavy rainfall (more than 200mm in 24 hours) will continue over these regions till Tuesday, after which the rainfall intensity will reduce,” said an IMD official.
In view of a cyclonic circulation present over the Comorin area along with heavy clouding observed over the southern Kerala and Tamil Nadu regions, as seen from the satellite images, a red alert (warning) has been issued over the southern districts of Tamil Nadu.
In the 24 hours until 8 am Monday, extremely heavy rain was recorded in 39 locations in the southern districts, according to S Balachandran, the IMD’s Deputy Director General of Meteorology. “It’s an extraordinary meteorological phenomenon,” he said.
In Thoothukudi, while Kayalpattinam saw a record 95 cm of rain, Thiruchendur and Sri Vaikuntam received 69 cm and 62 cm, respectively. In Tirunelveli district, Palayamkottai received 44.2 cm rain, breaking its previous record of 29.2 cm rainfall in 1963, and also its highest recorded December rainfall of 20 cm in 1931.
Overall, since October, Tirunelveli district has recorded 135% more rain than its usual monsoon average, followed by Kanyakumari (103%), Thoothukudi (68%) and Tenkasi (80%).
Tamil Nadu and Kerala both benefit from the winter monsoon during October- December. Nearly 48 per cent of Tamil Nadu’s annual rainfall is recorded during these months. —With inputs from Bengaluru
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