Even as around 30 districts and over 4 crore population in the country are highly vulnerable to extreme weather events like Lightning, the shocker is a majority of the districts and population belong to Odisha.
As per the recently released Climate Hazards and Vulnerability Atlas of India -2022 by IMD, Odisha has been ranked as the top state that is the most vulnerable state for lightning in the country. The State topped the lightning chart because a high of 20 districts is affected in the State. The State has only 30 districts.
'Lightning Map' Of Odisha
A glance at the IMD Atlas reveals that Sundargarh in Odisha tops the chart by virtue of having the highest number of lightning days in the country.
As per the report, the total number of lightning days annual during the Period from 1969 to 2019 in Sundargarh has been estimated at a whopping 508. It is followed by Mayurbhanj, Keonjhar, Cuttack and Ganjam. (see the below ).
Lightning Vs Thunderstorms
If the IMD's Atlas is to be believed, Odisha is the top state affected by lightning in the country. When it comes to thunderstorms, the top weather agency of the country didn't count any of the districts in the State as high to very highly vulnerable to thunderstorms.
As per the IMD report, nearly 60 districts and over 10 crore population in the country are vulnerable to this extreme weather event. But not a single Odisha district has made it into the highly vulnerable list of districts in the country.
The State Wise Tally Given Below.
- 12 Districts in Assam
- 12 in J and K
- 8 in Tripura
- 6 in West Bengal
- 5 in Manipur
- 4 in Uttarakhand and Arundachal Pradesh
- 2 in Kerala
- 1 each in Karnataka, UP, HP and Nagaland
Lightning Vs Thunderstorms
The country's top weather agency in its report has said the following.
Lightning: Lightning is an electrical discharge caused by imbalances between storm clouds and the ground or within the clouds themselves.
Thunderstorm: A thunderstorm is a type of storm with lightning and thunder.
The key takeaway, therefore, here is thunder and lightning accompanied by stormy wind are called thunderstorms, whereas lightning is a weather event that takes place without stormy wind.
Earlier, this year releasing it's Annual Climate Summary - 2021, IMD had said Odisha had massive 213 deaths due to lightning. In contrast, the State saw only 4 deaths due to the cyclonic storms in 2021. The State has topped the country in lightning deaths in 2021.
For this high toll in lightning, Odisha has been ranked second after Maharashtra in human toll due to natural disasters.