EVEN as the southern districts are struggling to stay afloat following unprecedented rain, the Regional Meteorological Centre has come under criticism from various quarters for failing to forecast the extreme rain in advance.
It was only around 2pm on Sunday that RMC upgraded the orange alert issued for Thoothukudi, Tirunelveli, Kanniyakumari and Tenkasi districts into red alert saying that extreme rainfall is expected in "one or two places" over the four districts. However, several parts of these districts received extremely heavy rain (more than 21 cm) on Sunday with Kayalpattinam in Thoothukudi district recording 95 cm in 24 hours ending on Monday morning.
Speaking about this, S Balachandran, deputy director general of meteorology, RMC, Chennai, said it is unusual for a cyclonic circulation to bring widespread rain of this scale. "As per IMD's warning system, red alert is the highest level of warning and calls for the system to be prepared. However, we have been giving orange alert for these districts since December 14. As signals indicated there is a possibility of extreme rainfall, we changed it to red alert. With climate change, we will have to expect such episodes of rainfall from here on," Balachandran said.
Red alert was sent to the government around 11 am on Sunday even though there was a delay in sharing it with the media, he added.
Private bloggers, who have been drawing attention to the potentially devastating rains before it began, said while the models had predicted heavy rain, even they did not know the extent. However, some of them, even on Saturday, had alerted social media users about rainfall up to 40 cm in these regions.
"The actual extent of it is not something anyone picked up but the intensity of rain could have been communicated more effectively (by IMD). The organisation's dissemination of information may not be ideal in today's social media world and some protocols may have to be re-evolved so as to enable information to reach the masses," a popular weather enthusiast said.
According to weather bloggers, Kayalpattinam in Thoothukudi recorded 95 cm of rainfall, the highest ever recorded in the plains of Tamil Nadu in a 24-hour period. Overall, it is the second-highest rainfall to be recorded in the state after 96.5 cm in Kakkachi in Tirunelveli in 1992.
Mahesh Palawat, chief meteorologist at Skymet Weather, said IMD's forecast may have been more accurate in case of a low-pressure area or a well-marked low-pressure area while this was picked up as a cyclonic circulation over the Comorin area. "It is moving in the westerly direction and the intensity is set to decrease significantly," he said.
RMC said 39 places received extremely heavy rain, 33 places very heavy rain and 12 places heavy rain. The red alert for Tirunelveli, Thenkasi, Thoothukudi and Kanniyakumari has been extended till Tuesday morning.
"As there is development of technology, we can forecast rain more accurately. In previous years, there have been situations where there was extreme rainfall without any warning," Balachandran said.
According to an official bulletin, Tiruchendur in Thoothukudi received 69 cm rain in the 24-hour-period ending Monday morning. Srivaikuntam in Thoothukudi recorded 62 cm, Tiruchendur in Thoothukudi and Moolaikaraipatti in Tirunelveli recorded 61 cm each. Majolai recorded 55 cm rain.
According to a professor from Anna University, the state's disaster response machinery takes into account alerts from the State Disaster Management Authority and the National Disaster Management Authority but these too rely on inputs from the IMD.