'We should expect extreme heat, extreme rains, floods, landslides and maybe cyclones. Not just this year, in the coming year as well.'
Light to moderate rain in many areas with heavy rain at isolated places is likely to occur in West Bengal's coastal districts of North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas and Purba Medinipur.
The death toll included over 450 from intense heat wave last summer, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
Surface temperatures have increased rapidly during the past century, leading to an increase in the frequency and intensity of tropical storms in the Arabian Sea, reports Sanjeeb Mukherjee.
At 11.23 am on May 20, 2026, 22-year-old Saanika Shah fulfilled a dream she had nurtured for five years by successfully summiting Mount Everest, the world's highest peak.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has predicted above-normal rainfall for most parts of India during the post-monsoon season (October to December), except for some areas in the northwest. The southwest monsoon season ended with the country recording eight per cent above normal rainfall.
The planet experienced its warmest January on record last month despite the development of La Nia, a climate pattern that usually brings cooler global temperatures, the European climate agency said on Thursday. This comes on the heels of the Earth experiencing its hottest year on record in 2024, also the first to see global average temperatures rise 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. According to the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), January 2025 recorded an average temperature of 13.23 degrees Celsius, 0.09 degrees warmer than the previous hottest January (2024) and 0.79 degrees above the 1991-2020 average. Scientists also found that the Earth's temperature in January was 1.75 degrees Celsius higher than pre-industrial levels. Global temperatures have stayed above the 1.5-degree mark for 18 of the last 19 months.
'The intensity and frequency of heatwaves will be much higher than in previous years over Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.'
The imaging technology in Nisar can provide very high-resolution data on changes as small as one centimetre in size on the earth's surface.
The year 2024 was not only the hottest year on record but also the first to breach 1.5C above the 1850-1900 baseline.
In Professor Sulochana Gadgil's passing, India has lost a scientific giant, a fierce intellect, and a compassionate soul, remembers Dr Madhavan Nair Rajeevan.
'We have not even used 0.1% of the available resources.'
In the 30-year period between 1986 and 2015, temperatures of the warmest day and the coldest night of the year have risen by about 0.63 degree Celsius and 0.4 degree Celsius, respectively.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has predicted above-normal rainfall for the upcoming monsoon season in India (June to September). The cumulative rainfall is estimated to be 105 percent of the long-period average. The IMD has also ruled out the possibility of El Nino conditions during the entire season. The monsoon is crucial for India's agriculture sector, which supports the livelihood of a significant portion of the population and contributes substantially to the country's GDP. However, while the prediction of normal rainfall brings relief, climate change is expected to cause variations in rainfall distribution.
Lightning claims more lives in India annually than any other extreme weather event. Between April and July this year alone, 1,621 people died due to lightning strikes.
Globally averaged temperatures in 2017 were 0.90 degree Celsius warmer than the 1951 to 1980 mean, according to scientists at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. That is second only to global temperatures in 2016.
Addressing a press conference virtually, India Meteorological Department Director General Mrutyunjay Mohapatra said September was likely to witness normal rainfall in the range of 91-109 per cent of the long period average of 167.9 mm.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) has officially confirmed that 2023 is the hottest year on record by a huge margin, smashing global temperature records.
El Nino, an anomalous rise in sea surface temperature off the Peru coast, has been observed to often cause the Indian monsoon to flounder, resulting in poor rainfall. Nearly 60 per cent of agricultural land is wholly rain-dependent.
"This warming trend is alarming," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.
According to Skymet Weather, the initial surge in the Monsoon rains can be attributed to the transition of El Nino into the neutral phase.
There is a substantial possibility of the emergence of La Nina, the opposite of El Nino, which invariably has a positive influence on the monsoon.
After the west coast, another cyclone is likely to hit the east coast by May 26-27, the India meteorological department said on Wednesday.
Data spanning the years 1951 to 2014 show that temperature and pressure conditions at specific locations in the Arctic region during the pre-monsoon period correlate with the Indian summer monsoon rainfall, points out Charu Bahri.
India will receive normal monsoon this season, country's meteorological department said on Wednesday in its forecast for the Southwest monsoon that covers 75 per cent of the country, and thereby may bring much-needed respite to the economy, which is reeling under the catastrophic effect of the Covid-19 pandemic.
'In 50 seconds, the pilots were fighting drag, trying relight, throttling up and avoiding obstacles.' 'They had neither height nor speed. There was no margin.'
The deadly landslides in Kerala's ecologically fragile Wayanad district were triggered by a heavy burst of rainfall, made 10 per cent heavier by climate change, according to a new rapid attribution study by a global team of scientists.
Data released by the IMD on Thursday showed that the mean minimum temperature (MMT) this December was 7.1 degrees Celsius.
The above map shows the country wise temperature change from 1990 to 2017 in Fahrenheit.
India is likely to experience below-normal monsoon rainfall this year, with a 20 per cent chance of drought due to the end of La Nina conditions and the potential for El Nino to take hold, private forecasting agency Skymet Weather said on Monday.
The independent group of scientists and communicators previously said that winters are quickly transitioning into summer-like conditions in north India, shortening the spring season.
Scores of people die every year due to cold waves that sweep across the north Indian plains.
Above-normal heatwave days are predicted in most parts of central, east and northwest India during this period.
While the city received some showers late Wednesday night, it remained almost dry on Thursday.
In the last 100 years, the earth's average surface temperature rose by about 0.8 degree Celsius with about two thirds of the increase occurring over just the last three decades.
'We are not saying we are going to face a drought... We are a doing and performing government. A contingency plan is being prepared,' Science Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan tells Rediff.com
IMD has decided to increasingly use cutting-edge technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) in forecasting, both to avoid such glitches and to counter the disruption of normal seasonal patterns as a result of climate change. It has formed various internal sub-groups of senior officials and meteorologists to decide on how best to use AI and ML in predicting cyclone intensity, and in making short-range weather forecasts (those valid for up to three hours) as well as long-range forecasts.
Though early days, meteorologists point towards a neutral La Nina during the initial phase of the four-month monsoon season this year that starts from June. If this holds true, by the time the rains hit the mainland, it could mean there would be one less reason to worry about the prospects of the monsoon this year. Weathermen said making any accurate prediction of how El Nino will behave and what impact it can have on the progress and distribution of rains is difficult to say at this point. A clear picture will emerge around late May or early June.
'Urbanisation results in heavy rainfall events.'
A below-normal monsoon can bring down India's GDP growth by 0.50-0.75 per cent this financial year, forcing the Reserve Bank to delay rate cuts to 2015, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch (BofA-ML) said.
