Rainfall data of Darjeeling - Sikkim Himalaya (MAY2017)

Brief summary :-

• Rainfall in May2017 for the Darjeeling - Sikkim Himalayas was deficient (except for Jaldhaka, in the foot hills of the Dooars). Most of the rainfall occurred in the first half of the month while the latter half was largely dry.
• We had our first fatality of the year with a tree smashing down and instantly killing the driver of a truck on NH10 near Melli on 09May2017
• We also had Cyclone 'Mora' brewing up in the Bay of Bengal but it did not affect us in any way

Credits : Maps and lower chart from IMD

Praful Rao,
Kalimpong district,
Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya,
9475033744

Rainfall data July 2014 and associated landslide activity.

Deficient rainfall in the Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya

As can be seen from the rainfall data of some stations of the region (slide -1) there was an overall deficiency in the amount of rainfall in the month of Jul2014. The monsoon rainfall normally peaks in July (see here) before starting to decline in Aug/Sep and withdrawing from the sub-continent in Oct.
However, in 2014 rainfall in Kalimpong was almost 40% deficient resulting in inability by farmers to plant the full paddy crop this year in some parts of Pudung village (Kalimpong). All other stations also show decline in rainfall in 2014 to varying degrees.
This is in keeping with the data obtained from IMD in slide -2 (see details here).

Landslide activity

• No major landslides and no deaths due to landslides in Darjeeling or Sikkim in July2014.
• Malin village in Maharastra, India - 151deaths due to landslide on 30Jul2014. 
• Pangla, on Dharchula-Kailash Mansarovar yatra, in Pithoragarh district - 5 deaths on 27July2014
  
  Praful Rao,
  Kalimpong,
  Dist Darjeeling

Rainfall Data for Sub Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim : October 2013

IMetD classifies its rainfall maps under four headers :

• Winter - January to February
• Pre-monsoon - March to May
• Monsoon - June to September
• Post Monsoon - October to December              

Slide - 1 - Shows the last rainfall map for the Monsoon season in 2013 ie from Jun-Sep2013. SHWB (Sub Himalyan West Bengal) and Sikkim went deficient in rainfall throughout the season receiving 15% less than the normal average.

Slide - 2 - Shows the predicted withdrawal pattern (in red dots) of the South Westerly monsoon along with actual trajectory that was traced (in green lines). The rain bearing winds withdrew entirely from the Indian sub-continent on the 21Oct2013. 

Slide - 3 - In the first month of the post monsoon season SHWB and Sikkim recieved 30% more rainfall than the normal average (154.2mm). The excess rainfall was the result of two days of incessant rainfall on the 14/15Oct2013 caused by Very Severe Cyclone 'Phailin' when most of this region received more than the whole months rainfall in just two days (Shown in last slide).
No major landslides were reported, perhaps because the entire Oct was otherwise dry.  

For the full 2013 Southwest Monsoon end of the season report by IMetD click here  

Rohan Rao,

Kalimpong,

Dist Darjeeling,

Email - rohan.rao1313@gmail.com

Rainfall data for Sub Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim : September 2013

The monsoon season thus far has seen an extreme event (the cloud burst) that devastated Uttarkhand, while the North East including Sub Himalayan West Bengal (SHWB) and Sikkim (which normally receives the highest precipitation in the sub-continent) receiving below normal rainfall. On the contrary, Rajasthan a desert state had excess rainfall.
Total rainfall in the sub-continent has been 6% above normal which has benefited the agriculture sector immensely with increased food production and the monsoon is still very active in many parts of the country (normally the SW monsoons start retreating in mid September).
In September 2013, SHWB and Sikkim saw less than normal rainfall and that has been the trend throughout the monsoon season this year.

Unfortunately even with the less than average rainfall, landslides still seem to find a way of affecting us, with five lives being lost in the village Tamabung (Yuksom - Tashiding constituency)  in West Sikkim on 01Sep2013.

Rohan Rao,

Kalimpong,

Dist-Darjeeling,

Email - rohan.rao1313@gmail.com

Rainfall data Darjeeling district and Sikkim: August 2013

August 2013 saw a flurry of activity in the Bay of Bengal with a number of low pressures forming. The low pressure reported just south of Kolkata by IMetD on 19Aug2013 caused moisture bearing clouds to move towards the Darjeeling Sikkim Himalaya resulting in the "Hurricane" in Darjeeling between 22:00 hrs and 00:00 hrs that night.

Strangely, even though the bay was swamped by low pressure systems in August 2013 , the Darjeeling Sikkim Himalaya and most of the North East still remained deficient in rain. Most of the low pressures that formed traced a North Westerly path giving excessive rain to most of central India and Rajasthan (shown above). 

No fatalities were caused by landslides in August 2013

September is when the SW monsoon slowly retreats from the Indian sub-continent, nonetheless from this month onwards STH will also include rainfall data from Siliguri and a few other stations in our monthly rainfall report for those interested in the hydrology of this area.   

Rohan Rao,

Kalimpong,

Dist-Darjeeling,

Email-rohan.rao1313@gmail.com

Rainfall data Darjeeling district and North Sikkim: July2013

The month of July2013, what was characterized by the formation of a number of low pressure areas mostly in the Bay of Bengal, off the coast of Andhra Pradesh or Orissa. These systems then moved inland initially on a northwesterly track and then later on a westerly direction drawing in moisture both from the Arabian sea and the Bay of Bengal.
It was this movement of the systems which resulted in excessive precipitation over central and west India and deficiency of rain in the eastern and the north eastern states.

In our region, Kurseong was the only town which had normal rainfall, the other towns all had less than normal precipitation.

From Aug2013 till the end of the monsoons, we will be tabulating rainfall over Gangtok and a few other places as well.

There were no major landslides in this area in Jul2013, except that on 30Jul2013 at around 6pm IST, what appears to be a 'cloudburst-like' condition in Upper Rimbi (W Sikkim) caused major damage to infrastructure in that area - mercifully there was no loss of life.

Unfortunately, we are unable to get rainfall records of the area.

Praful Rao,

Kalimpong,

Darjeeling district.

Rainfall data of Mar2013

Almost all landslides in the Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya are triggered by rain and therefore one of STH's primary role over the years has been to monitor rainfall. In so doing, we check rainfall on the IMD AWS stations and also track rainfall on our own small network of automatic rainfall gauges (ARGs) which we have installed at 4 places - a fifth ARG will also be up and running by end of April2013 in Mangan (North Sikkim). The locations of our ARGs is shown in the map :-

The pre- monsoon season in India technically is from Mar-May and as such our rainfall data chart for the month of March2013 is tabulated below :-

What is worth noting is that Kalimpong on 21Mar2013 received more rain in 90 mins (37mm - excluding hail stones) than the monthly average rainfall (see here for details).

Praful Rao,

Kalimpong