Rainfall Characteristics in the Upper Mandakini Catchment Since the Great 2013 Disaster
Abstract
Cloudburst rainfalls are widespread throughout the Himalayan landscape. On 16th and 17th June 2013, a considerable depth of rainfall occurred in the upper Mandakini catchment, which resulted in a record-breaking discharge in the Mandakini river and its tributaries, along with massive mobilization of materials resulting in vast numbers of landslides. This study is focused on the precipitation characteristics of the upper Mandakini catchment starting from 2013 to 2021. Twelve grids of the IMD rainfall data for the monsoon season (JJAS) are utilized for the analysis. It is observed that the yearly average monsoonal precipitation for the subsequent years has shown no significant change since 2013. But several outlier rainfall events (extreme) are detected in the following years with a random pattern, which may be considered a potential trigger for a flood like the 2013 disaster. Also, a decreasing trend in the June-July precipitation is observed; in contrast, August-September have exhibited an upward trend in the precipitation during 2013-2021, which may be a probable indication of the shift of the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) in the near future. Ultimately, Student's t-tests are performed to find any significant difference between the rainfall distributions of 2013 and 2021 over the monsoon period. June, July, and September have shown no significant difference, indicating a repeating pattern in the rainfall distribution. The results of this study put forward alarming evidence of the upcoming extreme rainfall events in the upper Mandakini catchment.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2022
- Bibcode:
- 2022AGUFM.H34E..02C