Team Herald
PANJIM: After witnessing deficit rains for the last four consecutive years, Goa recorded its wettest monsoons in 2019, after 20 long years. With 33 percent surplus rains, the coastal State surpassed the average normal trend of the last six decades, when it received 155.3 inches of rains.
Even as the four-month long monsoon season officially concluded on Monday, September 30, the withdrawal will take another fortnight. The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) Goa observatory has stated that the monsoon currents have weakened over the coast for now.
The season that began on a weak note with a deficit of over 14 per cent due to the delay of monsoon activity, ended with 33 per cent surplus, the highest after 2011, that had recorded 29 per cent surplus rains. Before that in 2010 also, the State witnessed 21 per cent surplus rains.
The 2019, the bumper season, which resulted into a trail of destruction, recorded 3943.8mm of rains.
August 6, was recorded as the wettest day of the season, wherein it rained for 24 hours in Valpoi recording 239.3mm of rain.
“The deficit was wiped off within a month time. This year, the south west monsoon currents were highly active over the coast,” IMD Goa director Dr Krrishnamurty Padgalwar told HERALD.
“For last 60 years, the normal rainfall for Goa has been 117.1 inches (2975.6nn). This year, the State received its highest rains in last 20 years,” he stated
When asked about the reasons for such a heavy downpour, Padgalwar explained that the monsoon had various characteristics like the impact of monsoon low-pressure area in the Bay of Bengal, offshore trough along the West coast and cyclonic circulation over interior Karnataka and Goa. “All these three features were quite active this season in bringing in so much rain,” he said.
Goa had been witnessing a deficit rainfall trend since 2015, wherein the deficit was 20 per cent. For that year, State witnessed total 2387.9mm rains. In 2016, the deficit declined to 1 per cent, with total rains of 2955.9 mm. However, the deficit jumped back to 14 per cent with 2555.2mm of rains in 2017 and 19 per cent deficit with 2410.5mm of rains.
