Climate change has made weather forecasting challenging: IMD Chief Mrutyunjay Mohapatra

“Climate change is leading to increased frequency and uncertainty in extreme weather events. It is also seen that drier regions are getting increased rainfall and wet regions are receiving lesser rainfall. Localised extreme events have increased, like higher intensity rainfall is occurring in lesser time duration,” Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, Director General, IMD, told The Indian Express.

“Weather forecasting has become very challenging in evolving climatic conditions. Extreme rainfall events are also occurring in a localised manner in a short span of time. To monitor and forecast these events at smaller temporal and spatial resolutions is very challenging,” noted the IMD chief.

In 2024, when IMD stepped into its 150th year, it launched Mission Mausam: a dedicated program to enhance the Met department’s weather observational network on land, ocean, and poles along with upgrading its weather model precision. Under its first phase, planned till 2026, with an economic outlay of Rs 2,000 crore, there are major plans to ramp up the observational network, informed IMD.

Along with Leh, meteorological centres in Shillong (2018), Amravati (2019), and Port Blair, Imphal, Kohima, and Aizawl (2023) are now operational. In the decade gone by, IMD said, forecast accuracy of all types of severe weather events jumped by 50 per cent in comparison to 2014. If in 2017, the forecast accuracy was one day in advance, the same today is five days in advance, giving ample time for administrators and disaster managers to plan rescue and rehabilitation. In case of forecasting the development of cyclones, the IMD has a mastery of doing it a week in advance versus 1-3 days in 2014. Among other improvements in the accuracy (up to 24 hours) are the forecast of heavy rainfall (about 80 per cent), thunderstorms (about 86 per cent), heat waves and cold waves (about 88 per cent).

Weather data remains the core for improving forecasting and the Met department plans to fill the gaps, especially in areas where access has been inherently difficult.

“There are some weather data-limited regions, mostly owing to the difficult accessible regions. For these regions, Automatic Weather Stations (AWS) and remotely sensed observations in terms of radar coverage are used. Crowdsourcing is also initiated in IMD to collect the feedback,” he added.

In its sesquicentennial year, the IMD introduced Panchayat Mausam Sewa, Mausam gram aimed towards ‘Har Har Mausam Har Ghar Mausam’, and indigenous decision support system – bringing hydrometeorological as well as socio-economic data together for better impact-based forecasting services and expanded coverage of radar for better monitoring and nowcasting. From 13 doppler radars in 2013, IMD today operates 39 and has plans to add more radars in the coming two years with a vision to take it to over 50 under Mission Mausam.