SW Monsoon withdrew from many places of Himachal: IMC

The prolonged rainy seasons are likely to end soon in the state as IMD announced that the west Monsoon system withdrew from many places on Sunday and it would likely completely vanish from the hill state in the next two to three days.

According to Met Office monsoon rain was 20 percent surplus in this season as the month of June recorded almost 19 percent excess rainfall, July 75 percent excess, and August by four percent from the normal, In the Month of September the monsoon turned weak and month recorded 42 percent deficient rainfall.

In a press release issued here today, an IMD spokesman announced that the Monsoon has withdrawn from  Una, Hamirpur, Bilaspur Solan Sirmaur, most parts of Kangra, Mandi, and Shimla, and a few parts of Chamba district in the past 24 hours. The conditions are becoming favorable for further withdrawal of monsoon from remaining parts of the state in the next 2-3 days, the Spokesperson said.

It is worthwhile to mention that monsoon arrived in most parts of Himachal Pradesh on 24th June 2023 compared to the earliest of June 9, 2000, and most delayed onset July 5, 2010.

For the entire monsoon or rainy season, the state had 20 percent excess rainfall. The State had a cumulative 884.8 mm rainfall from the Month of June to September against its normal 734.4 mm till departures yesterday.  Actual Rainfall in the months of June, July, August, and September was 121.7mm, 448.9mm,

247.6mm and 69.6mm respectively. In the Month of July, rainfall broke all previous records till 2004 in the state. 

Extremely heavy rainfall was observed in districts Kangra, Hamirpur, Chamba, Una, Bilaspur, Sirmaur, and Mandi at isolated places. The state faced a number of landslides, flash floods, and cloudbursts during the entire monsoon season (June-September) leading to extensive damage to material and human lives. For the period of 1901 to 2023, the state received the highest rainfall in the year 1922 with actual rainfall of 1314.6mm moreover State received the 36th highest rainfall during this year in monsoon.

In the season state recorded light to moderate pre-monsoon rainfall from June 1 to 21st June. The first spell of heavy rainfall occurred on June 6 at Bijahi in the Mandi district. With a spell of Heavy to very heavy rainfall from 22nd to 24th June at few places. The Monsoon entered in the state tentatively on June 25 however many heavies to extremely heavy spells of rainfall derailed normal life in the state.

IMD said that a very heavy rainfall spell occurred a number of times one heavy spell in June, Seven in July, five in August, and two in September.  Extremely heavy rainfall occurred one time in the months of July 8 & 12 and two times in August 11 to 14 and 20 to 23. The intensity of rain was highly erratic as most of the rainfall occurred in 25 days of rainy season and 35 days were mainly dry. However, the Monsoon was mainly defiant in the month of September but in 3rd week of month state received a large excess at many places.

During the season Una had 228 mm of rain in July, Pachhad in Sirmuar 220 mm on July 10, Nahan 250 mm on July 11, Jatton Barrage 238 mm, Kangra 273 on August 14, Sujanpura Tira 254 mm, Dharmshala 250 mm and Palampur 220 mm and Kahu in Bilaspur on Aug 23 and Kataula 210 mm. 

New rainfall 24 hrs 9 (July 9, 2023 ) rain records were broken after 95 yrs as Una had  238 mm rainfall in one day compared to 224 mm rainfall records of July 22, 1927. Similarly, new records of 220 mm of rain (10 July) at Pachhad in Sirmaur were recorded compared previous 160 mm of rain of July 26, 1973, Rohru had 185 mm of rain(July 9) compared to July 25, 1966.

In Kataula rainfall recorded 172 mm rainfall on August 14 compared to 165 mm rain( August 20, 2022) Pandoh had 178 mm ( on August 23) and 166 mm( on Aug 17) compared to 133 mm previous highest in Mandi district.

The state recorded the death of 503 people and 519 were injured. In the rain cummulative loss of Rs 9711.85 Cr was recorded. The state registered 168 landslides and 72 flashflood mishaps. 2933 houses were damaged by rain completely, 12266 partly, 420 shops and 7207 cowsheds were also damaged in the rainfall. A total RS 609 Crore estimated loss occurred to private structures, human and cattle loss, Rs 2949 Cr loss occurred to Public Works Department assets, s 2419 Cr Irrigation and drinking water supply scheme, and Rs 1917 Cr to state power electricity board.