Panaji: Though Saturday morning saw a few showers and increased rainfall in the afternoon, Aug will be the third consecutive month to end with a significant deficit. With a day left, the overall rainfall shortfall stood at 31%.In a season marred by the impact of El Nino, the monsoon has been largely weak, as forecast earlier.June was one of the driest in nearly two decades, ending with a 41% deficit. July, the peak season month with an average of 1,047mm rainfall, also logged a 36% deficit.“In one of the strongest concurrent El Nino events of the century, the neutral Indian Ocean dipole (IOD) conditions didn’t help the monsoon activity as expected,” said M R Ramesh Kumar, NIO chief scientist (retired) and meteorologist.The IOD phenomenon often significantly nullifies the El Nino impact.The Indian subcontinent logged a 14% deficit as compared to 31% in Goa. “Another reason for this was the weak low-level jet stream over Goa, with a wind speed of 20 knots as compared to a normal of 30 knots and above,” said Kumar.Out of 14 stations, only two, Valpoi (2,594mm) and Dharbandora (2,559mm) crossed the 100-inch mark. Of the remaining, only two, Sanguem (2,435mm) and Quepem (2,243mm) crossed the 2,000mm mark. Panaji had the lowest rainfall of just 46 inches, he said.On Saturday morning, the overall seasonal total had touched 1829.6mm, as compared to the normal value of 2650.5mm.During the last 24 hours, only Dharbandora recorded moderate rainfall of 26.6 mm, while light rainfall was reported in Sanguem (9.5 mm), Pernem (9.2 mm), Canacona (6.2 mm), Valpoi (4.4 mm) and Ponda (3 mm). The decrease in rainfall intensity meant that only 32mm of daily average rainfall was recorded over the last four days.
