Another cyclone brews for Andhra Pradesh: system expected close to the coast on 2 November evening, with extremely heavy rain on the coast

Andhra Pradesh has not finished counting the damage from Cyclone Arnab, and the sea is already sending another storm its way. In a press release issued at 2.25 pm on Saturday, 31 October, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said a system in the southeast Bay of Bengal is likely to grow into a cyclone and arrive in the west-central Bay, off the Andhra Pradesh coast, on Monday evening, 2 November.

How the system is growing

At 8.30 am on Saturday the system was a well-marked low pressure area sitting over the southeast Bay, close to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and the Andaman Sea. The IMD expects it to move west-northwest, gather into a depression within six hours and strengthen into a cyclonic storm over the following 24 hours.

The IMD has not yet named a landfall point; that will come in later bulletins as the track becomes clearer. Should it reach cyclone strength, it gets the name Murasu, which India put forward for the list of names used for storms in this region. Arnab was the first cyclone the Bay produced this year; this would be the second.

What the rain forecast says

The worst day for the coast looks like 2 November, when isolated places in coastal Andhra and Yanam may get extremely heavy rain. In the IMD’s scale that means more than about 20 cm in a day. Very heavy rain is forecast at isolated places in the coastal districts on 3 November and in Rayalaseema on both 2 and 3 November. Coastal Andhra may also get heavy rain at isolated places on 1 and 4 November.

Winds will pick up too. Thundersqualls with speeds of 50 to 60 kmph, gusting to 70 kmph, are forecast along the Andhra coast on 3 November. From 31 October to 4 November the coast and Rayalaseema can expect strong surface winds. The State Disaster Management Authority has told fishermen not to go to sea.

Telangana is in the path of the rain as well. The IMD forecasts heavy rain at isolated places and fairly widespread to widespread rain across the state on 2 and 3 November, with thunderstorms and gusty winds of 40 to 50 kmph. Parts of Telangana already received 12 to 20 cm in the 24 hours up to Saturday morning. Odisha is likely to get very heavy rain on 3 and 4 November.

Weather over a busy week

The forecast lands on one of the busiest weeks in Andhra Pradesh’s local government calendar. Polling for 13 municipal corporations and 87 municipalities is on Sunday, 1 November, and the votes will be counted on Tuesday, 3 November, a day for which the IMD has forecast very heavy rain and squalls along the coast.

Before this system, the IMD’s outlook for November had pointed the other way: below-normal rain, less than 77 per cent of the long-period average, for south peninsular India as a whole. A single cyclone can change that picture for the coast in two days. Telugu Scope first reported the low pressure area when it formed over the Andaman Sea.