The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : A weather buoy deployed off Puducherry coast

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Friday, Jun 15, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

A weather buoy deployed off Puducherry coast

Rajesh Nair

FACILITY FOR FORECASTING: The buoy deployed off the Pudcherry coast.

PUDUCHERRY: Thanks to the installation of cutting-edge technology equipment for real time weather forecasting off Puducherry coast and in the land, fishermen belonging to 20 hamlets along the shore here can venture into sea with the knowledge of maritime weather condition, including the height of waves and the precise location of a good catch.

The Ministry of Earth Sciences deployed a wave rider buoy about three km off Chinna Veerampattinam coast on May 27 to gather vital information on the height of waves, the condition of surface wind, the pressure of waves and the presence of fish within 10-km radius of the location of the buoy.

The information would be received at the Pondicherry Multipurpose Social Service Society (PMSS) data centre here, an NGO based here. The PMSS would pass on the information through the public address system, which the agency had already put in place in the 20 villages. Soon, a digital display board would be set up in the villages. One such had already been put at Cuddalore OT, said T.M Balakrishnan Nair, Head of Ocean Sciences and Information Services at Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad. Mr. Balakrishnan told over the phone that the instrument records the data at about eight meters above the seabed in its internal memory called Data Storing Unit at every 20 minutes interval. This is the first time that the buoy was used for a community purpose and the agency was ready to partner with NGOs in other places for similar endeavour. The Coast Guard would monitor the condition of the floating buoy on a weekly basis as boats and nets could easily damage it, he said.

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