Even though Cyclonic storm Asani is unlikely to make landfall in Odisha coast, it will mostly trigger heavy rainfall in several districts of the State while brushing along the coastline of Odisha on May 10.
Senior scientist of Regional Meteorological Centre in Bhubaneswar, Umashankar Das on Sunday said rainfall activities will commence in coastal districts of the State from May 10 evening under the impact of the cyclone which will have intensified into severe category.
The districts of Ganjam, Gajapati and Puri will have high probability of witnessing maximum rainfall in the range of 7 to 11 cm on May 10.
Yellow warning with forecast of heavy rainfall has been issued for some places in five districts of Ganjam, Puri, Khordha, Cuttack and Jagatsinghpur on May 11. One to two places in the districts might also witness heavy to very heavy rainfall in the range of 11 to 20 cm.
While Danger Signal 1 has been hoisted at 4 ports of Paradip, Gopalpur, Dhamra and Puri, fishermen are being barred from venturing into sea due to rough sea conditions, informed Das.
The IMD has forecast that cyclone Asani is likely to bring wind speeds of 40 to 50 kmph gusting up to 60 kmph in coastal areas of Odisha while moving parallel to the State's landmass on May 10 and 11.
As per the latest bulletin of the IMD, cyclonic storm named 'Asani' developed from the Deep Depression, lay centred over South east Bay of Bengal 450 km west-northwest of Car Nicobar (Nicobar Islands), 380 km west of Port Blair (Andaman Islands), 970 km southeast of Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh) and 1030 km south-southeast of Puri (Odisha).
The system is moving at a speed of 16kmph in northwest direction. It is very likely to move northwestwards and intensify further into a Severe Cyclonic Storm over east central Bay of Bengal during next 24 hours.