In August 2023, Rishikesh in Uttarakhand received an incredible amount of rain, making it the wettest town in India. Over 1,900 millimetres of rain fell between August 1 and August 25, Vineet Kumar Singh, a research scientist at the Typhoon Research Centre of Jeju National University in South Korea said. This was even more rainfall than Cherrapunji and Mawsynram, usually the rainiest places in the world. However, Cherrapunji recently got a lot of rain too, so it’s now the wettest place again.
Cherrapunji regains world’s wettest title
Cherrapunji and Mawsynram, the two wettest places in India and the world, received 1,876.3 mm and 1,464 mm of rainfall respectively during the same period. However, in the past three days, Cherrapunji has regained the top spot with 332 mm of rainfall, Singh added.
The heavy rains caused flooding in Rishikesh, and the Ganga River rose dangerously high. Sadly, one person died when a wall collapsed on August 9. This monsoon season has been tough for other mountain areas like Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand too. In July, they had a lot of rain because of special weather conditions.
Monsoon break shifts rain pattern
The heavy rain in August happened because the monsoon, which brings most of India’s rain, took a break. This means the usual rainy area moved to the Himalayan foothills, while the rest of the country stayed dry. This happened from August 7 to 18 and then again from August 24 onwards. As a result, August might become the driest month on record for India.
Most of the extreme rainfall happened in August due to the monsoon being in a break phase. The monsoon enters a break phase when the monsoon trough, which is an extended region of low pressure that causes most of the rainfall over the country during the season, moves north of its normal position over northwest and some parts of central India.
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