Remal Our first cyclone for the year.
Sat, 25 May 2024
Remal - Our first cyclone for the year.
Remal has been birthed by the Bay of Bengal, and is the first of the cyclones for the year. Named by Oman and meaning”Sand” it is a relatively modest one and is unlikely to cause destruction, other than customary flooding of low lying areas.
As of now it is in the East central part of the Bay and is predicted to move in a Northeasterly direction initially, becoming more Northerly as it crosses the Sunderban delta stretching across West Bengal and Bangladesh.
But what Remal brings to the head of the bay is a tidal surge and this for the low lying sunderban delta supporting one of the largest mangrove forests is destructive. The surge goes further inland flooding low lying paddy fields and disrupts the lives of countless communities eking out a living on the edges of the marine ecosystem. Torrential rain accompanies Remal, and being the first cyclone of the summer season brings much needed relief from the searing heat waves of the past month.
Cyclones like Remal when they form lower down the Bay skirting the Andaman and Nicobar islands, inevitably become much stronger and larger, having the advantage of being out in the open warm and moisture laden atmospheric conditions longer. It takes many parameters to come together to form a cyclone (also called typhoons in the Pacific and Hurricanes in the Atlantic), but the chief among them is a warm sea surface. Cyclones form predominantly in the warm tropical waters of the oceans, where warm surface waters evaporate and rise by convective currents to form large cloud structures. This creates a low pressure area where the moist warm air has risen, inviting adjoining cooler air to replace it. This cycle of warm air rising and cooler air replacing it at lower altitudes, mostly at sea level, creates the classic twister effect.
Once the dynamism of the increasing wind velocity takes over, it is like a pirouetting ballet dancer. Faster and faster she will pirouette stretching her arms outward to balance the centrifugal forces. As the earth rotates left to right on its axis when seen from the North pole, the now alive and violent energy mass of rapidly rotating wind, starts drifting westwards and Northwards (in the Northern Hemisphere). This is called the coriolis force, and is what gives the cyclone movement. As the huge energetic mass of twisting and churning wind and rain reaches higher latitudes it mostly tends to veer off to the east. This is not always the case, but meteorologists look for factors like lower pressure systems in adjoining areas, among other factors, to forecast the direction and curvature the storm system is likely to take
As of now it is in the East central part of the Bay and is predicted to move in a Northeasterly direction initially, becoming more Northerly as it crosses the Sunderban delta stretching across West Bengal and Bangladesh.
But what Remal brings to the head of the bay is a tidal surge and this for the low lying sunderban delta supporting one of the largest mangrove forests is destructive. The surge goes further inland flooding low lying paddy fields and disrupts the lives of countless communities eking out a living on the edges of the marine ecosystem. Torrential rain accompanies Remal, and being the first cyclone of the summer season brings much needed relief from the searing heat waves of the past month.
Cyclones like Remal when they form lower down the Bay skirting the Andaman and Nicobar islands, inevitably become much stronger and larger, having the advantage of being out in the open warm and moisture laden atmospheric conditions longer. It takes many parameters to come together to form a cyclone (also called typhoons in the Pacific and Hurricanes in the Atlantic), but the chief among them is a warm sea surface. Cyclones form predominantly in the warm tropical waters of the oceans, where warm surface waters evaporate and rise by convective currents to form large cloud structures. This creates a low pressure area where the moist warm air has risen, inviting adjoining cooler air to replace it. This cycle of warm air rising and cooler air replacing it at lower altitudes, mostly at sea level, creates the classic twister effect.
Once the dynamism of the increasing wind velocity takes over, it is like a pirouetting ballet dancer. Faster and faster she will pirouette stretching her arms outward to balance the centrifugal forces. As the earth rotates left to right on its axis when seen from the North pole, the now alive and violent energy mass of rapidly rotating wind, starts drifting westwards and Northwards (in the Northern Hemisphere). This is called the coriolis force, and is what gives the cyclone movement. As the huge energetic mass of twisting and churning wind and rain reaches higher latitudes it mostly tends to veer off to the east. This is not always the case, but meteorologists look for factors like lower pressure systems in adjoining areas, among other factors, to forecast the direction and curvature the storm system is likely to take
Climate change has without a doubt heated the earth by about a degree celsius more since the last few decades. This has resulted in warmer sea surface temperatures across the oceans. Warmer seas will tend to evaporate more water vapour, and warmer air will hold more vapour. This leads to larger cloud masses holding more precipitable water. Rising moist air creates more rapid pressure differentials leading to wind migration and wind shear, leading eventually to a rotating wind pattern called vorticity. This is how depressions form leading eventually to a cyclone.
Of course if a few parameters are adverse to cyclone formation, depressions would stay as such and eventually die out. This year has seen the end of El Nino in the Eastern Pacific, and the birth of La Nina in its place. El Nino leads to dry air formation in the Indian Ocean while La Nina does the opposite. Another long distance parameter is the Madden Julian Index which has to be conducive to cyclogenesis. This year both these indexes are positive.
So one can forecast a more violent cyclonic storm brewing in the Bay of Bengal this year mostly in October/November before the start of the North East monsoon. But the Arabian Sea might give birth to a violent storm even earlier, as early as next month. Storms each year are getting more violent and more destructive, with the increasing warming of the seas. It is time we took note of the potential of these destructive systems, which can become a perfect monster storm of huge massive proportions bringing inconceivable destruction onto our land and people.
Remal will likely spare us this time, but other systems likely in the distant womb of mother nature will not
Of course if a few parameters are adverse to cyclone formation, depressions would stay as such and eventually die out. This year has seen the end of El Nino in the Eastern Pacific, and the birth of La Nina in its place. El Nino leads to dry air formation in the Indian Ocean while La Nina does the opposite. Another long distance parameter is the Madden Julian Index which has to be conducive to cyclogenesis. This year both these indexes are positive.
So one can forecast a more violent cyclonic storm brewing in the Bay of Bengal this year mostly in October/November before the start of the North East monsoon. But the Arabian Sea might give birth to a violent storm even earlier, as early as next month. Storms each year are getting more violent and more destructive, with the increasing warming of the seas. It is time we took note of the potential of these destructive systems, which can become a perfect monster storm of huge massive proportions bringing inconceivable destruction onto our land and people.
Remal will likely spare us this time, but other systems likely in the distant womb of mother nature will not
