Less rainfall expected over next 3 months – Hydromet Office

…negative effects may be experienced late December
The Hydrometerlogical Office of Guyana on Friday disclosed that less than usual rainfall can be expected over the next three months, owing to climatic conditions affecting the oceans.

This was related during the fifth National Climate Outlook Forum (NCOF) at Herdmanston Lodge on Friday morning by a Specialist Meteorologist, Komalchand Dhiram.
“The next three months is usually packed with the usual rainfall that we’d have what we call or some people call it the Christmas rain or end of the year rain but because of the existing El Nino that we have in the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean we will have a decrease in that amount,” he explained.
Although persons can look forward to rain, the Specialist informed that it would not be the usual “Christmas rain”.
According to him, negative effects are more than likely to affect large-scale farmers by late December to early January 2019. Because of the effects that are likely, the department said an advisory will be issued later.
El Nino is a phenomenon which when present causes a warmth in the ocean that impacts the temperature of the water, which in turn affect the warmth in the atmosphere as well, which then affects the conditions necessary to produce rainfall, he pointed out.

New webpage
Nonetheless, the Hydrometerelogical Office is currently working to develop its webpage to be able to provide updates on climate conditions as they become available.
According to Dhiram, the upgrade to the webpage has become necessary with the advancing of technology across the region and world at large. It is the department’s hope to develop a web application (app) as the need may arise in the future.
He explained, “We’ve been getting a lot of feedback from folks that it is important to have an app because that’s with the culture right now and that’s what society demands”.
The meteorologist informed that the office is currently engaged with the Columbia University, International Research Institute for Climate and Science so that the web application can be developed.
The new page, will be referred to as the ‘Maproom’, will allow users to click and access forecasts.
The web page will play a vital role in updating the public on how much rain fall to expect during which period, as this too has an impact on tourist influx, he explained.
When developed, the information to the general public will be free of cost, Dhiram added. The meteorologist said the Department hopes to have the web base up and running by mid-next year.
The Maproom will be designed to include maps to depict where heavy rainfall is expected in the next six days, and how much rainfall is expected, along with where large or small amounts of rainfall are expected in the next three months, among others.
Additionally, maps will also show rainfall patterns that can be expected for El Nino.