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direction, then it moved in the northwesterly direction and intensified at 1200
UTC on 1
st
June with intensity T 1.5, centre 14.5N/69.0E, and wind speed
about 40 knots. After this it moved in a northwesterly direction at 00 UTC of
4
th
June; it intensified very rapidly with centre 18.4E/65.1E, T 4.5 (Eye visible)
and T 5.0 at 03 UTC. Further intensification is seen at 12 UTC on 4
th
June,
intensity T 6.5 and centres 20.2N/63.8E. At this it has been classified by IMD
as super cyclone with wind speed about 140 knots and pressure 920 mb. After
maintaining peak winds for about nine hours, this has been downgraded to
very severe cyclonic storm status early on June 5. It was further disorganized
and crossed the coast on 7th June at 0400 UTC and position 25.5N/58.1E with
intensity T 2.5.
Similar behaviour of tropical cyclone
'Nargis'
formed over the Bay of
Bengal during 26
th
April to 2
nd
May 2008. 'Nargis' initially appeared as a low
pressure area over southeast Bay of Bengal on 26 April and concentrated into
a depression at 0300 UTC of 27 April. The system initially moved in a
northwesterly direction and intensified at 0600 UTC on 27
th
April 2008 with
centre 12.0N/87.0E and intensity T1.5. It further intensified at 1200 UTC on
the same day with centre near 12.1N/86.3E and intensity T2.0 (banding
features). It continued to move in the same direction and further intensified
into Cyclonic Storm 'Nargis' at 0000 UTC of 28
th
April 2008 with intensity
T2.5 and centre near 13.0N/85.0E. The system further concentrated into Severe
Cyclonic Storm (SCS) with intensity T3.5 at 0900 UTC on 28
th
April and lay
centered at the same position. Thereafter the SCS 'Nargis' slightly moved in a
northerly direction and further intensified into Very Severe Cyclonic Storm
(VSCS) with intensity T4.0 on 29
th
April, 0200 UTC and centered at 13.4N/
85.0E. Slight disorganization was observed in banding features due to increase
in shearing at 1200 UTC of 29
th
April, so the system weakened with intensity
T3.5 and centre at 13.8N/85.0E. Afterwards it started recurving in east-north-
easterly direction at 1400 UTC on 29
th
April. Moving in an east-north-easterly
direction it re-intensified with intensity T4.0 at 0400 UTC of 01st May 2008
and centered at 15.7N/89.3E. Then the system moved in an east-north-easterly
direction and again intensified with intensity T4.5 and centered at 16.0N/92.5E
at 0000 UTC on 02
nd
May 2008. The system has attained its maximum intensity
T5.0 declared by IMD at 0500 UTC on 2
nd
May and lay centered at 15.9N/
93.4E. Moving in an easterly direction VSCS “Nargis” crossed the South
Myanmar coast on 02
nd
May at 1200 UTC and was located at 16.0N/94.7E in
intensity T 5.0.
4.2 Upper Tropospheric Warm Core Anomaly at 200 hPa
Data from the microwave satellites are not sufficient to monitor the continuous
growth and decay of tropical cyclones over the area as it is available just once
in 12 to 24 hours from a particular polar orbiter. So the sounding information
of the cyclone has been used by pooling the sounding data from other polar
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