The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Highest rainfall recorded for a December day in 14 years

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Dec 20, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Highest rainfall recorded for a December day in 14 years

Staff Reporter

City receives 16.2 mm rainfall; clear weather by Saturday

— Photo: K. Gopinathan

CHEEK BY JOWL: It was fun going to school in Bangalore on Wednesday when the drizzle turned into a downpour towards evening.

Bangalore: At 16.2 mm, the city on Wednesday received more rain than it had all of December.

In fact, even though the meteorological centre terms the shower as “light to moderate,” the city on Wednesday received more rain for a December day than it had in 14 years.

The last time rain exceeded the figure was on December 5, 1993, when the city recorded a whopping 66.4 mm rainfall.

Light drizzle

Starting as a feather-light drizzle at 1.30 a.m. on Wednesday, it turned into a significant shower by 4.30 p.m. and continued well into the evening.

The downpour was clearly unrelenting – to a point where midweek work pressures paled in comparison to another challenge: that of just getting to work.

Ask Muskaan Bhat. After a patient half an hour wait at the Fraser Town bus stop, she reconciled to the fact that buses were few and far between.

But opting for an autorickshaw, she realised, was just as big a mistake.

Her six kilometre ride to work, which would have come at about Rs. 30, cost her four times the amount.

“In fact, I bargained the fare down from Rs. 150 to Rs. 120,” she says.

Sunshine soon

But there were consolations too. The howling winds that had reached 46 kmph on Tuesday had tempered down to 30 kmph.

And the temperature was very bearable at 18.1 degrees Celsius. “By Thursday the rain should begin to abate. I am expecting that the weather will clear up by Saturday,” said G. Vijayaraghavan, director of the meteorological centre.

Scanty rainfall

Rainfall has been scanty to say the least this season of the northeast monsoon: the city received half its “normal” quota of rainfall in November, and December had received no more than 3 mm of rain until Wednesday’s shower.

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