Bhubaneswar: The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) on Wednesday confirmed that a low-pressure area continues to persist over the Bay of Bengal (BoB), triggering heavy rain and thunderstorm warnings across Odisha.
The system is expected to intensify and move west-northwestwards, impacting North Coastal Andhra Pradesh and South Odisha within the next 48 hours.
According to the IMD, the low-pressure area over West Central and adjoining northwest Bay of Bengal, off the coasts of North Andhra Pradesh and South Odisha, remains active as of 0830 hrs IST. The associated upper air cyclonic circulation extends up to 7.6 km above mean sea level, tilting southwards with height.
The monsoon trough at mean sea level passes through Bhatinda, Ambala, Shahjahanpur, Varanasi, and Daltonganj before extending south-southeastwards to the low-pressure area over the Bay of Bengal. An east-west trough stretches from the central Bay of Bengal to the northeast Arabian Sea adjoining Kutch, affecting Telangana, North Maharashtra, and South Gujarat.
In its midday bulletin, the IMD issued an orange warning for heavy to very heavy rainfall accompanied by thunderstorms, lightning, and gusty surface winds reaching 30-40 km/h at isolated places in Koraput and Malkangiri districts. A yellow warning has been issued for similar weather conditions in Gajapati, Ganjam, Rayagada, Kalahandi, Nabarangpur, Nayagarh, Kandhamal, Nuapada, and Bolangir.
Other districts including Balasore, Bhadrak, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Cuttack, Jagatsinghpur, Puri, Khurda, Sundargarh, Jharsuguda, Bargarh, Sambalpur, Deogarh, Angul, Dhenkanal, Keonjhar, Mayurbhanj, Sonepur, and Boudh are also likely to witness thunderstorms with lightning and gusty winds in the next 24 hours.
The IMD has cautioned that these weather conditions may persist until August 17.
