After torrential rains battered Mumbai and its suburbs for the past three days, the country’s commercial Capital began to limp back to normal, even as the number of rain-related deaths mounted to 27 and more than 5,000 marooned people were rescued and shifted to safer places in the rain-ravaged State.
With some let up in the rains and consequent recession in floods in the metropolis, the suburban trains on the Central Railway’s Main and Harbour line networks and Western Railway — considered the lifelines of Mumbai — operated behind the schedule during the day. However, road traffic chaos continued for the fourth consecutive day.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) and the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) reported that parts of the metropolis recorded 150 to 200 mm rainfall from 8 am on Tuesday to 8 am on Wednesday.
In its forecast for the next 24 hours, the IMD said, “Heavy to very heavy rainfall is very likely at isolated places of the city and suburbs. Occasional gusty winds reaching 45-55 kmph very likely,” according to the weathermen forecast for the day.
“Extremely heavy rainfall has been recorded over the past two days. Moreover, since midnight of Tuesday-Wednesday, there has been continuous rainfall Despite the heavy rains, routine life in Mumbai continues smoothly,” the BMC said.
On a day when there was no improvement in the flood situation in various parts of the State, five bodies of a family were found from an agricultural field in Erandol in Jalgaon district in north Maharashtra. They appeared to have died from electrocution. Similarly, a 17-year-old boy died after he came in contact with a live high-tension wire in Bhandup area of north-east Mumbai.
Of those rescued from flooded areas, Mumbai accounted for 500, followed by Raigad (1,332), Thane (610), Palghar (500), Nanded (293), Ratnagiri (112), Satara (361), Pune (292) and Sangli (471).
Heavy rainfall was reported from the Western Maharashtra division districts of Sangli, Satara and Kolhapur, Pune city and neighbouring Pimpri-Chinchwad witnessed severe floods at various places, a situation that prompted the local civic authorities to shift hundreds of people to safer locations on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday.
Owing to unabated rains in the last few days, water was discharged from dams in Pune, including Mulshi, Panshet, Varasgaon, Khadakwasla, Pavana and Temghar. From Khadakwasla which is built on the Mutha river and located 21 km from Pune city, water was discharged at a rate of 15,000 cusecs in the afternoon, after which the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) issued alerts to the people living in the low-lying areas about the possible flooding.
Meanwhile, weather experts have said that early warning systems and their adaptation by the authorities in Mumbai and its suburbs are the way forward to protect lives, livelihoods, and critical infrastructure.
Since August 15-16 parts of Mumbai and the larger Mumbai metropolitan region (MMR) have recorded over 800 mm rainfall.
“While there is a natural variability of monsoon weather systems, climate change acts like a steroid. The northward swing of the southwesterly monsoon winds are pumping massive amounts of moisture from the warm Arabian Sea into northern Western Ghats. This northward swing is a combination of global warming, especially the warming over the Middle East, and the natural variability of the monsoon winds,” said climate scientist Dr Raghu Murtugudde, Emeritus Professor, University of Maryland and Retired Professor, IIT-Mumbai.
“Mumbai’s torrential downpour is the result of strong monsoon winds lashing the city, intensified by the combined pull of a low-pressure system over east India and another over the Gulf of Khambhat. This sudden burst of rain follows the city’s driest July since 2015, which failed to meet its monthly average rainfall. Whilst the exact role of climate change in this particular event will need to be assessed through scientific studies, the overall trend is evident: more intense rainfall occurring over shorter durations is consistent with what we expect in a warming world,” Dr Akshay Deoras, Research Scientist, National Centre for Atmospheric Science, University of Reading, UK said.
“We all know that there has been a rise in temperature due to global warming. Secondly, the exponential warming of the Arabian Sea has increased the moisture influx along the West Coast, contributing to heavy precipitation. In this scenario, the only way out is to have a very good network of early warning systems, nowcast systems for urban flooding. More importantly, these advance warning systems should be citizen-centric, which means the information should reach out to people so informed decisions can be taken,” Dr Subimal Ghosh, Institute Chair Professor, Department of Civil Engineering & Convener, Interdisciplinary Program in Climate Studies-IIT Mumbai, said.
