Panaji: With India meteorological department (IMD), Panaji, forecasting moderate rainfall during the week ahead, the monsoon current over Goa appears unlikely to chip much from the weekend deficit of 47%.Though a few systems are active in the neighbouring regions, their impact on cloud-formation over Goa is minimal and the month is likely to end with a sizeable deficit. During the last two days, IMD recorded just 34.1mm of daily average rainfall.“The weak monsoon over the state is due to the absence of the low level jet stream, which brings copious amounts of moisture into peninsular India, including Goa,“ said meteorologist and NIO chief scientist (retired) M R Ramesh Kumar.The jet stream’s core passes through 15 North – the latitude passing over Goa – at a height of 1,500m above mean sea level. “The wind speeds have been of the order of 10-15 knots, instead of 30-35 knots usually observed during the low level jet stream epochs,” he said.While a week ago, the shortfall had crossed 70mm, the rejuvenation of the monsoon current had yielded the highest 24-hour rainfall of 89.5m till the morning of June 23 during the present season.This was followed by 56mm rainfall on June 25 and 54.1 on June 24, but just 19.2mm and 14.9mm have been recorded on June 26 and 27.During the last 24-hours, only Ponda recorded near-heavy rainfall of 60mm while Canacona received 22.4mm, Pernem 21.2mm and other centres on a lesser scale.The seasonal total of rainfall has touched just 422.8mm, as compared to the normal value of 803.3mm, leaving a nearly 50% deficit.
