State to have two Doppler radars

Jisha Surya
First Published : 24 Jun 2010

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The state too joins the beneficiaries of the Rs 1,000crore modernisation plan of the India Meteorological Department (IMD). Under the plan, two Doppler radars will be installed within two years in the state. Apart from these, the IMD is busy with the installation works of Automatic Weather Station (AWS) and two Rain Gauge stations in every district. These two projects are expected to give a facelift to the Met Centre in Thiruvananthapuram.
The Doppler radars will be installed in Kochi and Mangalore by next March. It will be installed in Thiruvananthapuram within two years. The radar will provide short range accurate weather prediction within a radius of nearly 400 km. So the entire state will be covered by the three radars coming up at Mangalore, Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram.
"Forecast will be sharp, as this accurate weather prediction machine can assess the intensity of rain from a cloud, windspeed, movement of the clouds and thunderstorms," Met Director K. Santhosh said on Wednesday.
After signing an MoU signed with a French company Meteo France International in 2009, the IMD has ordered a 'Synergy system'. As many as 12 Doppler radars have been installed in the country under the project.
Comprehending the limitation of the lack of regional weather monitoring systems, the IMD Thiruvananthapuram is now exploring sites to install AWS in every district. Two Automatic Rain Gauges too will be installed in every district soon. The IMD has secured an NOC from the State Government to install the systems in each district.
"As of now, there are only five AWS centres in Kerala. With the installation of AWS in every district, more local information on rainfall, temperature, wind speed, atmospheric pressure etc will be available," Santhosh said.
"No manual intervention is needed for these systems. It has sensors which will send the data to satellite. The IMD centre will monitor the data and sufficient information will be provided from here," he added.