On Friday afternoon, the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) issued a ‘thunderstorm with lightning’ alert for Bengaluru and nine other districts in Karnataka. The Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC), too, had predicted widespread light to moderate rains. Heavy rains and thunder in isolated areas is also expected over the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) area. For the next two days, including Monday morning, isolated heavy rainfall is predicted, along with scattered to widespread, light to moderate rains.
A forecast issued by the IMD Bengaluru office at 3:10 pm said, “Thunderstorm with lightning accompanied with light to moderate spells of rain/showers is likely over Bengaluru rural/Bengaluru urban/ Tumkur/ Kolar/ Chikkaballapur/ Ramanagar/ Hassan/ Chikmagalur/ Kodagu/ Dakshina Kannada districts in next 03 hours.”
The KSNDMC on Friday predicted that scattered to widespread, light to moderate rains with isolated heavy to very heavy rains are likely over south-interior and coastal regions of Karnataka. Isolated to scattered, light to moderate rains are likely over north-interior Karnataka and widespread light to moderate rains with isolated heavy to very heavy rains are likely over the Malnad region.
The IMD said that the predicted rainfall activity is due to a depression formed over northwest Bay of Bengal, off the Odisha coast, which is moving north-east onwards with a speed of 24 km/h. The depression is likely to have crossed West Bengal and the adjoining Bangladesh coasts between Sagar Islands (West Bengal) and Khepupara (Bangladesh) over the Sundarbans, around Friday noon.
The upcoming rains in Karnataka will come at the tail-end of a rainy few weeks across the state, with four districts in north Karnataka reeling under floods and flood-like conditions.
The IMD said that the southwest monsoon was active over coastal Karnataka and South Interior Karnataka on Thursday, as rainfall occurred in most of coastal Karnataka. South-interior Karnataka and isolated places over north-interior Karnataka saw scattered rainfall.
Siddapura in Udupi and Nuggehalli in Hassan received the highest rainfall in the state within the last 24 hours, with both recording 80 mm of rainfall each.