By : Shrishti Mehra
Mumbai weather: The unexpected change in weather caused traffic to come to a halt in the city.Around 3 p.m. on Monday, Mumbai had torrential rainfall, followed by a big dust storm.
It rained a lot in Satara and Thane, two nearby cities, in addition to Mumbai. Bad visibility also forced the closure of the runway at Mumbai Airport starting at 3:57 pm. There was little visibility and strong winds, thus flight operations were halted for around sixty-six minutes. At 17:03, the activities started up again. The airport saw fifteen diversions during this period.
“A thunderstorm with lightning and mild to moderate rain, as well as gusty winds reaching 40-50 kmph, is quite likely to occur in isolated areas of Mumbai’s districts over the next 3-4 hours. “Take precautions when moving out,” the India Meteorological Department advised.
Mumbai’s Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC) has also issued a yellow notice for Thane, Palghar, Raigad, Solapur, Latur, Beed, Nagpur, Ratnagiri, and Sindhudurg districts. The weather department predicts thunderstorms with lightning and gusty gusts (30-40kmph) in isolated areas.
Meanwhile, an orange alert has been issued for the districts of Pune, Satara, Sangli, Nashik, Kolhapur, Ahmednagar, Aurangabad, Jalna, and Parbhani.
Metro Rail paused services between Aarey and Andheri East metro stations when a banner landed on the overhead wire owing to heavy winds, according to a spokeswoman. Meanwhile, suburban services on the Central Railway were disrupted as an overhead equipment pole between Thane and Mulund stations bent due to heavy winds.
Although the intense heat was somewhat relieved by the showers, power outages were reported in Kalwa, Thane district, and other locations. In the Ghatkopar neighborhood of Mumbai, an iron hoarding collapsed due to strong winds and rain, injuring seven persons.
The following is RMC’s forecast for Mumbai on Tuesday :
Mumbai : It’s likely to be hot and muggy in several isolated areas of Mumbai.
Thane and Palghar : Heat waves are quite expected in small regions of Thane and Palghar. However, there is a potential of rain or thundershowers in the evening.
Raigad : In isolated areas, thunderstorms with lightning and gusty winds (30–40 kmph) are expected.
Sunil Kamble, the head of IMD Mumbai, stated that the city is seeing heavy rainfall due to thunderstorm activity in Madhya Maharashtra caused by wind and trough interaction. This would result in very modest showers across Mumbai.
On Friday, Santacruz reported a maximum temperature of 33.6 degrees Celsius, while Colaba reached 34.5 degrees Celsius. The minimum temperatures were 26.8°C and 26.2°C, respectively.