Mumbai faces intense overnight thunder, lightning but light rain – Hindustan Times

Mumbai and its suburbs witnessed recurrent flashes of lightning and loud claps of thunder between 1.30 am and 3 am on early on Saturday.

Also read: Parts of Delhi to remain cloudy; light rains in some areas today

Though the rumbling thunder sounded almost like mini explosions, there was hardly any overnight rain recorded either in the suburbs or south Mumbai. Between 11.30 pm and 8.30 am, the Santacruz weather observatory representative of the suburbs recorded 6.9 mm rain while Colaba, representative of south Mumbai, recorded 15 mm rain.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) had predicted on Thursday itself that the city and suburbs could witness partly cloudy conditions with the possibility of thundershowers in the evening or late night over the weekend. “On early Saturday morning, radar images showed very intense echoes over Alibag that slowly moved over Mumbai leading to thunder and lightning with light drizzling but faded soon enough. Similar weather is expected on Saturday and Sunday night or Monday early morning,” said KS Hosalikar, deputy director general, western region, IMD.

After a record breaking rainfall in July and August, September began with a break in rain activity with less than 20 mm rain over the first five days of the month. This led to hotter conditions as the maximum temperature was at 33 degrees Celsius in the suburbs and 32 degrees Celsius in south Mumbai, both a degree Celsius above the normal mark. However, high humidity ranging between 85-90% led to sultry weather.

“These factors are leading to land heating and allowing the formation of tall clouds during the evening or later at night. However, rain activity is likely to be subdued over the next week for Mumbai region,” said Hosalikar.