MINISTER FOR MINISTRY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY AND MINISTRY OF EARTH SCIENCES (SHRI S. JAIPAL REDDY)
(a) - (e) A Statement is laid on the Table of the House.
STATEMENT LAID ON THE TABLE OF THE LOK SABHA IN REPLY (a) to (e) OF STARRED QUESTION No. 371 REGARDING “NOWCASTING OF
WEATHER†TO BE ANSWERED ON WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 19, 2012
(a) Yes Madam.
(b) Government of India through Earth System Science Organization (ESSO)-IMD has operationalised its location
specific nowcasting weather service across the country including the web based inputs. Under this service activity,
that covers 117 urban centres currently on experimental basis, nowcast of severe weather (Thunderstorms; heavy rainfall
from lows/depressions over the land) in 3-6h range is issued. Origin, development/movement of severe weather
phenomena are regularly monitored through all available observing systems (Automatic Weather Stations-AWSs; Automatic
Rain Gauges-ARGs; Doppler Weather Radars-DWRs; Automatic Weather Observing Systems-AWOS; satellite derived wind vectors,
temperature, moisture fields etc.) are assimilated to generate predictions (prepared both in text as well as in
graphical form) on 3h time range. Web GIS rendering of the nowcast products is implemented for enhanced spatial
representation of the severe weather intensities associated with warnings.
(c) With the commissioning of the state-of-the-art observing (675 Nos. of AWSs; 955 Nos. of ARGs; 15-DWRs),
monitoring/early warning and data visualization/information processing and communication technologies under the
Phase-I of the modernization of IMD, several manual operations have been fully automated. All the manpower that was
engaged earlier for such manual operations have been provided due orientation, training and skill development
opportunities not only to attain appropriate operating skills of advanced technological platforms but also contribute
efficiently to the quality enhancement through customization of sector specific warning and forecasting services.
Commissioning of the High Performance Computing (HPC) system at the ESSO-National Centre for Medium Range
Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF) and ESSO-IMD has provided opportunity to assimilate satellite radiance data in to the
global/regional forecast systems and to enhance the spatial resolution of the global forecast systems from about
50km grid scale to about 22km grid scale. The performance evaluation of the new global forecast system has demonstrated
enhanced forecast skill quantitatively.
(d) In order to capture the characteristics of the severe weather in real time, state-of-the-art 24X7 monitoring
system comprising 14-DWRs, located at Agartala, Chennai, Delhi-Airport, Delhi-Lodi Road, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata,
Machilipatnam, Nagpur, Patna, Visakhapatnam, Lucknow, Patiala and Mohanbari is made functional. DWRs at Mumbai and
Bhuj are undergoing site acceptance tests while it is under commissioning at Bhopal. DWRs commissioning is put on
hold at Goa, Paradip and Karaikal for the want of clearances from the Ministry of Defence that is under the
consideration of Committee of Secretaries (COS).
(e) Commissioning of DWR network covering the whole country would have to happen in a phased manner in view of the
various factors such as site selection; site survey for height of line of sight of locating the antenna;
available/emerging technology variants for their suitability as per terrain variability based frequency of operation
over hill states and NE States etc. Despite the above, the Government is committed to set up and enhance gradually
its observational network of DWRs, AWSs, ARGs, etc. for monitoring abnormal weather patterns and upgrading its
forecasting capabilities, so that advance warning can be provided to National Disaster Management Authority
(NDMA), Ministry of Home Affairs, and Ministry of Agriculture to tackle the impacts of the adverse and extreme
weather phenomena.
