Our Bureau
New Delhi
The early rains have struck the Southern regions of India a week prior to the expectations. The predictions of weather forecasts went wrong as early monsoon poured in the regions of Kerala and Karnataka. India has launched a new weather model that is going to be an innovation in India’s weather forecasting world.
The Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) has developed an indigenous weather forecasting model called the Bharat Forecasting System (BFS). The model will enhance the weather forecasting abilities of the organisation and will allow them to predict the weather more accurately in smaller areas and in a localised manner. The BFS will be first used in this monsoon season.
M Ravichandran, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, stated, “The tropical region is a chaotic region for weather. The change in weather patterns is unpredictable, and higher resolution models are required to capture the spatial changes. Earlier, we used to issue one forecast for four villages. The BFS will enable us to issue separate forecasts for each of the four villages.”
It is being reported that the ministry has spent a roundabout of 90 crores on a super computer that will be used to power this weather forecasting system. The reports suggest that the plan is to supply more data to the Bharat Forecasting System in the coming two years by using this super computer that will help in doubling the size of India’s weather radar network. The new supercomputer is known as Arka and was installed at the IITM campus last year. It comes with a capacity of 11.77 petaflops and storage capacity of 33 petabytes.
The new system will be a boon to the farmers as it has the capability to forecast at a resolution of 6 km which is basically half of what the older system could do. This will basically allow them to deliver forecasts for smaller regions in the country and predict a more certain forecast.
