Severe Cyclone Asani will, on Tuesday, come closest to India’s east coast near Andhra Pradesh and Odisha and soon recurve off land, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast.
“The cyclone is very likely to move nearly northwestwards till Monday night and reach west-central Bay of Bengal, off north Andhra Pradesh coast and adjoining Odisha coast. Thereafter, it is very likely to recurve north-northeastwards and move away from north Andhra Pradesh and Odisha coasts,” the IMD said in its forecast.
By Monday evening, the storm had reached within 600 km of Odisha and Andhra Pradesh coasts. The storm maintained its track along the northwestward direction, with speed ranging between 12 km per hour and25 km per hour.
Ganjam, Puri, Gajapati, Bhadrak districts in Odisha reported windy conditions along with light to moderate intensity rainfall (less than 64 mm showers in 24-hours) on Monday.
As per 5.30 pm observations of IMD, Cyclone Asani was located at about 390 km southeast of Kakinada and 390 km south-southeast of Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh, 510 km south of Gopalpur and 580 km south of Puri in Odisha. According to the Met department, Asani, after swerving the coast, will start weakening into ‘cyclone’ category starting Tuesday night and continue to remain so on Wednesday.
The IMD has predicted rainfall of light to moderate intensity with heavy spells at isolated places in Visakhapatanam, Puri, Ganjam, Bhadrak, Balasore, Jagatsinghpur and Kendrapara districts in the next three days.
Due to rough sea conditions and squally winds touching speeds up to 90 km/hr, fishermen have been advised against venturing into the sea until Thursday.
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