People residing in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, brace yourselves for a hot summer!
The Indian Meteorological Department has announced that a warmer summer can be expected over the next three months, till the onset of monsoon.
Speaking to TNM, IMD Director Y K Reddy said that although hotter days are primarily expected in April and mainly in May, they cannot be ruled out in March either.
“This coming March-May we are going to have a warmer summer as compared to the last 1 or 2 years. More heat wave days and high intensity of temperature are expected,” Y K Reddy said.
Nellore, Prakasam, Krishna, Visakhapatnam and Srikakulam are some of the districts expected to be the worst affected.
“Temperatures could go up to 47-48 degrees. Many days will see 43 degrees and above. This year, we can expect more than 30 days when temperatures will be above 43 degrees. In 2017, we had a heat wave on 23 days. This year it could be more than that,” he explained.
Residents in coastal districts are already witnessing days that are hotter than normal, though the temperatures haven’t crossed 40 degrees.
“In some places in coastal AP, temperatures 4 degrees above normal are being seen, but all of them are below 40 degrees. If the temperature is more than 40 degrees – 5 degrees above normal – then it will be a heat wave situation. There will be many such situations in the coming months till the onset of monsoon,” Y K Reddy added.
Temperatures in many locations have already started soaring, including in Kurnool, Anantapur, Kadapa, Vijayawada, Visakhapatnam, Tirupati and more. Temperatures in many places ranged between 37 and 39 degrees.
The Met department earlier said that the pre-monsoon months will be warmer than normal and that a heat wave is expected to hit 16 states in the country.
The average temperature will be at least 1 degree Celsius higher than what was seen in previous summers in most regions across India. In certain regions of the south, the temperature rise could be 0.5 degrees, the department had said.