Odisha gets its first Doppler radar station at Paradip today

Sambad English Bureau Published On : Nov 21, 2015 at 12:31 PM

Odisha Sun Times Bureau

Bhubaneswar, Nov 21:

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First Doppler radar station in Odisha launched in Paradip today by additional principal secretary to the Prime Minister PK Mishra, in the presence of IMD director general LS Rathore and Chief Secretary Gokul Chandra Pati.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) is launching 17^th Doppler radar station in India on Saturday. This will enable the MET department to predict any kind of disturbance with in 500 km in the Bay of Bengal.

“The radar has long been awaited will definitely prove a boon for Odisha keeping in view the wrath of cyclonic storms being borne by the state. The radar will help extensively in weather prediction in a real time manner,” said MET director Sarat Sahu.

He added that, the first of its kind radar station in the state will help forcast cyclonic storms, excessive rainfall, thunderstorms and hailstorms with greater accuracy.

IMD has already installed Doppler radars at Agartala, Bhopal, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Machilipatnam, Mohanbari in Dibrugarh, Mumbai, Nagpur, Patiala, Patna, Srinagar and Visakhapatnam. The Pradip Doppler radar station will be 17^th in the country.

The radar at a cost of Rs 30 crores has been built in a joint collarboration with China and set up by Chinese scientists, here. The doppler radar is highly sensitive and will lead to prior information about low pressure, cyclonic storms, depression, weather disturbances, rain forcast, location, direction and movement and intensity of the cyclonic circulation, the time of its landfall and wind speed.

“Earlier, we used to depend on the Doppler radars at Visakhapatnam and Kolkata for the prediction of low pressures, depression or even cyclones. Now we will be able to predict any kind of disturbance over the Bay of Bengal within a radius of 500 km,” said Sahu.

The foundation stone to start the Doppler radar began in 2005 and the construction work started on 2007.

Meanwhile, the IMD preparations are on for installation of another radar station at Gopalpur, where work is already completed while two more at Sambalpur and Balasore, are in initial stage.

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