Failed forecast - a new normal or exception? How weather dept is trying hard to improve its reputation
India Today
The Director-General (DG) of IMD, Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, explains to India Today the complexity of weather prediction and why in certain cases even the top-most body fails to read it correctly.
The monsoon arrived in Delhi at the fag end of June, almost a normal to hit the national capital. The welcome rain was a good one, but since then the rains have disappointed the Delhiites so far.
One more thing which has been rather disappointing in the last two weeks or so is a poor forecast by the India Meteorological Department (IMD) for the national capital. There were several yellow and orange alerts given by the Met department but all of them missed the mark comprehensively.
Monsoon forecasts have failed measurably in the case of Delhi due to the poor interpretation of the data projected through the different models. According to the experts, weather prediction is a mathematical exercise largely dependent on the accuracy of the data and how this is interpreted through highly technical calculations.
Even slight misrepresentation of this data can lead to inaccuracy, which is quite common when there is no major active system present in a locality. Since the onset of the Monsoon, the major monsoonal system has remained elusive for the national capital. Even the rains which have been recorded on Monday and Tuesday were due to the local system rather than any Monsoon trough passing through Delhi.
Experts claim that although scientifically the weather forecast system has improved in a major way during the last five years, weather developments are still tough to predict in a fool-proof way.
The Director-General (DG) IMD Mrutyunjay Mohapatra explained to India Today the complexity of weather prediction and why in certain cases even the top-most body fails to read it correctly.
Mohapatra explains the forecasting issues, "Forecasts can't be 100 per cent accurate, although our 24-hour forecast is correct by almost 80 per cent and we have improved it by almost 40 per cent in the last five years. Even the five-day forecast is more accurate and the accuracy rate is almost 60 per cent."
