Bangalore lacks enough gauges to record rainfall

With the City experiencing irregular rainfall and abnormal weather patterns, weather experts have called for installation of more rain gauges and weather stations across the City.

However, officials of the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) officials observe it is difficult to do so because there are certain criteria to be followed, apart from space constraints. IMD’s search for apt places in government and private areas has not been successful.

This is because there are different criteria for installing different weather instruments. One, there should not be any tall building or tree around the instrument.
Two, a distance of at least 10-15 km should be maintained between rain gauges.
Three, it should not be located in low-lying areas and should be installed on an even surface.

An IMD official said it was difficult to find a proper place to instal the instruments. It is not possible to instal them in all wards of the City as it is an expensive affair.

Automatic rain gauges are now present in IMD head office, GKVK and Hesaraghatta.

Automatic weather stations are at Bangalore City, Electronics City, Madavara (Nice Road), Gopalanagar and Somapura. There are manual weather reading centres at HAL Airport, KIA, IMD head office and Yelahanka. There are 20 other rain gauges in Bangalore to  record rainfall, which help in district average rainfall calculations.

The official maintained that there were around 20 weather stations in Bangalore not registered by the Economic and Statistics Department and IMD.

These provide wrong readings and are privately installed on rooftops, balconies, high-rise buildings. People are advised not to follow them, he said.