Chennai and Tamil Nadu Weather Forecast: Monday, November 11

In what likely are signs of a welcome change in weather parameters for Chennai city, winds are trending northerly to north-easterly and could become sustained north-easterly to easterly in the days to come. At 9.40 am this Monday, they were north-easterly to easterly after emerging from the stranglehold of the erstwhile Very Severe Cyclone Bulbul, which ended in landfall far away over the Bengal and Bangladesh coast.

Winds may take known pattern

The Chennai Met Office of the India Meteorological Department (IMD) assessed humidity at 80 per cent, temperature at 30.7 degrees Celsius and dew point temperature 26.7 degrees Celsius under partly cloudy conditions.

Winds are forecast to become sustained north-easterly to easterly progressively, which is just as they should be during a North-East monsoon, the very nomenclature leaving nothing to imagination. Chennai and the larger Tamil Nadu coast can expect to benefit in terms of badly needed rains sooner rather than later.

Isolated to scattered showers is the call for Tamil Nadu and Puducherry during the rest of the day, while it would be partly cloudy conditions for Chennai city and neighbourhood.

The Pacific is churning!

Developments in the West/North-West Pacific and the South China Sea further lend credence to the outlook for easterlies to establish. Already, tropical storm Nakri, impacting Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, is forecast to send down a remnant circulation with an accompanying barrage of easterlies into the Bay of Bengal.

International models are tracking two other potential storms in the West Pacific one after the other. These storms are currently westward-tracking, but the models are not sure if they will be able to sustain this track.

The spurt in Pacific activity follows the passage of the cyclone and monsoon-setting Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) wave from the Arabian Sea to the Bay of Bengal and now into the South China Sea/West Pacific.

MJO wave sparking activity

The MJO wave, with an entourage of moisture, clouds, rainfall and storms, moves periodically from East Africa into the Indian Ocean (Arabian Sea and the Bay) setting off low-pressure areas and cyclones.

The ongoing wave was responsible for the three strong cyclones in the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal — Kyarr, Maha and Bulbul — and is already triggering activity in the Pacific as well.

Storms tracking to the West in these ocean stretches in the massive Pacific are generally found to serve the cause of the North-East monsoon with favourable implications for the Tamil Nadu coast.

Model forecasts, domestic and foreign

Domestic private forecaster Skymet Weather sees partly cloudy conditions with increasing probability of sharp showers in the city into the evening/night.

International forecaster AccuWeather saw variably cloudy weather with a passing shower, with the temperature peaking at 33 degrees Celsius (real feel of 40 degrees Celsius), even as air quality will be poor. Winds will range from weather-friendly southerly to the non-friendly south-westerly.

Weather.com, an IBM Business, picked northerly winds prevailing at around 10.15 am under partly clouded skies with fair weather and the day's maximum temperature likely peaking at 31 degrees Celsius.

Winds will turn decisively north-easterly to easterly during the course of the day, though the model found a nil possibility of showers.

WeatherBug says it would be mostly sunny out there this Monday, with winds being predominantly north-north-easterly.

The temperature had already reached the day’s maximum of 31 degrees Celsius (feels like 37 degrees Celsius) at 10.20 am. It will be partly cloudy during the night, with winds shifting more north-easterly.

Chennai’s bloggers and Twitterati discussed the impending change in weather for the city as well as for Tamil Nadu as a whole:

COMMENT NOW