How146;s the Weather?

At 26, I thought I had put my childhood fascination for balloons well behind. But here I am at the Meteorological Observatory in north Mumba...

At 26, I thought I had put my childhood fascination for balloons well behind. But here I am at the Meteorological Observatory in north Mumbai, very near the Sahar airport, fascinated by a six-foot tall specimen filled with hydrogen gas.

As scientific assistant at the unremarkable-looking observatory8212;the locals call it the gubbara factory8212;I8217;m required to keep an eye on surface temperature, pressure and humidity, among other things.

Weatherman NP Patil, my boss for the day, secures the balloon to a white plastic box, which contains instruments to gauge climatic conditions and transmit the data back to the observatory. The Big B known as the Radio Sonde/Radio Wind is supposed to take the box along with it to the outer reaches of the atmosphere around 35,000 metres, where it will investigate the upper atmosphere.

I walk up to the white balloon and tug at its reins. The big fella looks ready to go. Patil says two such probes worth Rs 5,000 each are sent up every day to check upper air conditions. I hold on to the six-footer until he secures the payload. The monsoon winds carry the balloon towards Nagpur as soon as we release it.

The observation station is a large hall with lots of charts, a few probes in various states of assembly and an expensive looking cupboard-sized machine with several dials and screens. Scientific assistants DS Redkar and BN Patil are watching the balloon8217;s flight on a computer screen. The younger Patil explains the readings on the screen that show the height, winds, temperature, pressure and pretty much everything the balloon is going through.

The men are taking measurements of the upper atmosphere for this part of the earth and for the rest of the world. The readings are refreshed every 1.8 seconds. Every once in a while, the relative humidity indicator blanks out. Patil brushes it off as clouds.

I am, meanwhile, tracking the balloon. Within a few minutes of take-off, it comes under the influence of monsoon winds. The temperature dips steadily and the air becomes rarer. In about 25 minutes, it has climbed about nine km above the earth and senses a temperature of -25.6deg;C. Now, that8217;s chilly.

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Higher up, the direction of the wind has changed. It8217;s now blowing the balloon against the monsoon winds at a brisk 49 knots per hour. My attention begins to wander to the other equipment in the room. Surely at an altitude of 14 km, the winds do not mean anything. Wrong again. Information about the winds and the dew point at that kind of altitude, I8217;m told, are what the aviation industry8217;s big boys need. In about an hour, we have more than 2,000 readings, indicating the pressure and temperature variations in a 20-km column above us.

The balloon8217;s tale ends quite abruptly. At about 20 km, the signal system gives way and I miss out on the potential pleasure of a loud blast 35 km high.

The next day I visit the weather forecasting office in south Mumbai, which is where the data from the observatory is transferred. The large forecasting room has drawing boards and a number of charts and graphs along the sides. The lethargic rain clouds are taking their time climbing the Deccan plateau; the Indo-Gangetic plain is dry and the phones won8217;t stop ringing. Most calls are about the Class X results published that day, though.

The director of the facility, Thakur Prasad, an experienced forecaster from before the time 8216;8216;when people quit jobs and changed professions every year8217;8217;, and an aide show me satellite pictures of the subcontinent and radar images of the skies. A similar patch shows up in both images8212;dark clouds looming over Maharashtra and the Kutch.

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8216;8216;Aaj kya bolna hai,8217;8217; asks a duty officer to his colleague. 8216;8216;Thoda kam dikh raha hain... let8217;s say medium to heavy rains in the city,8217;8217; he replies, then proceeds to call up the municipal corporation, the Mantralaya, and the AIR.

Back at home, slumped in front of the telly, I realise the maps from the afternoon at the Met office are staring back at me! For the first time ever, I listen to the weathergirl8212;to check whether she got it right.