RMC withdraws red alert for Chennai and Tiruvallur
The Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC) withdrew the red alert for Chennai and Tiruvallur on Thursday evening and issued an orange alert for these districts as heavy to very heavy scattered rainfall is expected till Friday morning.
S Balachandran, head, RMC, said that the well marked low-pressure area concentrated into a depression on Thursday evening and moved westwards at a speed of around 18 km/hour and lay about 100 km south-southeast of Chennai.
“This is likely to move west-northwestwards and cross north Tamil Nadu coast between Chennai and Puducherry early morning on Friday,” Balachandran said. Strong winds of up to 40 km/hour is expected along coastal districts during the landfall accompanied by heavy isolated showers.
Earlier on Thursday, several parts of the city received sporadic spells of heavy to very heavy rainfall while Tiruvallur received about 11 cm of rainfall and Cuddalore witnessed 10 cm of rainfall. The weather stations in Nungambakkam and Meenambakkam received 4.8 and 3.3 cm of rainfall respectively until 5.30 pm on Thursday.
The depression over Bay of Bengal crossed the coast between Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh early on Friday, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said.
The system crossed the coast between Chennai and Puducherry. “The Depression over southwest Bay of Bengal moved north-westwards and crossed north Tamil Nadu & adjoining south Andhra Pradesh coasts between Puducherry & Chennai during 0300-0400 hrs IST (3-4 AM ) of today, the 19th November 2021,” the IMD said in an update on its official Twitter handle.