Red alert in Kerala, heavy rains to lash several areas

Heavy rains continued to lash parts of Kerala on Thursday and the Indian Met Department has forecast heavy to very heavy rains in the state.

According to the Skymet, a private weather forecasting agency, the intensity of rains will peak between July 18-20 with some really heavy rains being observed in pockets. The remaining days is expected to record moderate to heavy amounts of Monsoon rain.

The weather forecasting agency has also said that this spell may lead to the flood-like situation due to which red alert has already been issued by the state authorities.

Places which are likely to observe flooding rains are Punnalur, Alappuzha, Thrissur, Kozhikode and Wayanad.

According to weather experts, Southwest Monsoon has been very disappointing so far as the month of June ended with a deficiency of 44 per cent of rainfall.

Besides, the deficiency of the rainfall between June 1 to July 17 in the region is a whopping 47 per cent.

The weather experts believe that Kerala now requires heavy rains to fulfill the deficient figures if any. "But with the forecast of some really good rains, we could see the rainfall deficiency in the state coming down to some extent.