CHENNAI: Even as Tamil Nadu was expecting the North East monsoon to become active, the weather department has forecast a three-day relatively ‘dry spell’ from November 6.
This year, the onset of monsoon was delayed. Also, the initial rain was underwhelming. S Balachandran, Director, Area Cyclone Warning Centre, told Express, the depression over the West Central Bay of Bengal, near Visakhapatnam, will move northwestwards and gradually towards Bangladesh coast during the next 48 hours. He said, the rain for the past few days was due to this system which was now moving further away from Tamil Nadu. This, will contribute to only isolated instances of light rain in some parts of the State from Sunday.
Elaborating, Balachandran said, “We expect the absence of rain-bearing clouds, hence the maximum temperature in daytime will rise one to two degree Celsius above normal.”
He said, there may be heavy rain during a 24-hour period on Saturday in south coastal Tamil Nadu. The warning has been given to the districts of Ramanathapuram, Kanniya Kumari, Thoothukudi and Tirunelveli.
This comes in the wake of a good downpour on Thursday in many places such as Kangeyam in Tirupur district (7 cm) and Rameswaram (7cm). Besides, there was widespread rain in Dindigul district, where overnight showers was recorded in Natham and Dindigul city (3cm). This spell of rain led to increased hopes among farmers, particularly in the delta region.