By Govinda Raju

Hawa Ghar was how the observatory of the India Meteorological Department at Shadipur, Port Blair was always known to the people of Andamans. It was identified by the white balloon that it used to send up twice a day for the study of weather parameters above 30,000 feet that guided the aircrafts that flew over Port Blair. Set up in 1942 according to DC Gupta, Director-in-charge, it had very limited activities that the common people were not even aware of.

However, 2004 tsunami changed everything for the local Hawa Ghar. From a sleepy small establishment located in a nondescript wooden building in an unfrequented corner of the capital city, it is being turned into a modern meteorological station equipped with the state-of-the-art sophisticated equipments and instruments to meet the challenging task of recording and providing vital statistics to the laboratories on the mainland to interpret and alert the nodal agencies about earthquake, tsunami, impending storms and rainfall in the area of influence.

Spread over an area of over 1.36 hectare of land on a small hillock in Shadipur, The IMD Port Blair is about to embark upon ambitious plans for expansion plans. To start with, the old wooden structures have gone and the department has got a a new concrete building that houses various instruments that observe, record, monitor and pass on the information to laboratories in New Delhi and Pune for analysis, interpretation and necessary action.

It has a 10 meters Automatic Weather Station that records station level pressure, day temperature, max and min temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and direction and soil temperature and passes on the data directly to Pune satellite. It is an unmanned station. Six more such stations are likely to come up at Diglipur, Mayabunder, Long Island, Hut Bay, Nancowrie and Campbell Bay.

Automatic Real Time Seismic Monitoring Network has already been installed at Port Blair, Diglipur and Campbell Bay that sends signals directly to New Delhi through satellite and tsunami warning is flashed within 10 minutes of a tsunami generating earthquake.

A Pressure Tube Anemograph works 24/7 to monitor the wind speed and direction. It records the squall and cyclone that results in the warnings flashed to maritime services and fishermen etc.

A Doppler Weather Radar is planned to be installed in the complex that will provide 3-4 days advance weather forecast within a radius of 300 kilometres. It would be a boon to maritime services as also the farmers. The department also proposed to run a weekly weathercast in conjunction with the state agriculture department for the benefit of the farmers.

And, it has the age-old weather balloon that is set twice a day; 5.30 AM and 5.30PM. The balloon reaches up to a height of 30,000 feet and transmits the pressure, temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and direction at different levels that comes handy for the aircraft flying over Andaman Islands.

As the days go by, the Port Blair station of Indian Meteorological Department is poised to play a much greater role in the lives of the people of the territory; whether they recognize it or not.