Met experts dismiss fears of dry spell: ‘Dry episodes have no impact on rainfall’
Meteorological Department (MET) has said the surge in temperatures in the month of August has no impact on rainfall, dismissing the likelihood of dry spell in 2018/19 rainfall season.
Director of MET Jolamu Nkhokwe dismissed the speculations in an interview on Monday saying it is too early to come up with such conclusion as they are model used in rainfall forecast.
“When we are introducing our season rain forecast we use models and other factors that come into play. As for predictions, we normally rely on sea surface temperatures in the oceans and not hot episodes.
“What we should be aware of is that every day there are different factors that come into play as you have seen this winter has been a bit mild. We had a one week event where we had cold spell and then we had a rise in temperatures and to say it will have an impact I think it’s too early,” he said,
Nkhokwe added that, “Next week climate experts from the SADAC region will meet to produce region forecast through which Malawi will derive its rainfall season forecast.”
Commenting on the dry episodes, MET Director said there is no scientifically proven link between hot episodes and rainfall.
“Hot episodes have not been scientifically interlinked with the rainfall and nobody has done that. And for your information, while we are experiencing these hot episodes you can find that all the sudden we can have a very cold spell that can interrupt the hitting that is happening now,” he said.
In its statement on weekly weather update dated August 5, 2018 the department of MET confirm the considerable rise in temperatures in the month of August.
MET is appealing to the public to wait for the season rainfall forecast that the department will issue in due course
