The northeastern part of the Indian Ocean, i.e. the Bay of Bengal (BoB) is located near some of the most complicated tectonic zones on the Earth. An earthquake of magnitude ~6.0 occurred on 21 May 2014 near the coast of Odisha. Occasional moderate to large earthquakes in BoB highlight the need to study precise hypocentre locations, and focal mechanisms to understand the cause of intraplate seismicity in BoB.

Original Source

Unprecedented, widespread, and devastating hailstorms occurred during February and March 2014 over north peninsular India (study area). A diagnostic study has been carried out to understand the causes for the same. Over the study area the atmosphere was convectively unstable due to the incursion of warm and moist air from Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea which was overlaid by cold and dry midlatitude westerlies caused due to the unusual upper oceanic heat content of the Pacific Ocean.

Western disturbances have a long history of climatological, synoptic and satellite observations based studies. In present study an attempt has been made to understand the different aspects of western disturbances like movement, associated convection, induce systems and associated weather. The western disturbances (WDs) during post monsoon and winter season have been selected for the study as they are mainly responsible for precipitation over western Himalayan region and adjoining plains of northwest India.