Forecast for Met dept not good

Bangalore: The meteorological department that traces rain, storm and wind in the state has been having communication problems for a month now. As a result, crucial weather updates to various centres regionally and nationally -- railways, flight operators as well as public -- have been disrupted.
"From mid-March to April 15 we did not have internet or telephone services.Worse, there was no power supply for a week. Being in the heart of the city, we feel as if we are working from some remote village. We have to send timely reports on weather conditions to other states. But we cannot even check email or get printouts. I had to go out to an internet centre nearby to send information," department director A Muthuchami told TOI.
The department needs to check on agro-agricultural field meteorological unit from agricultural universities, analyze morning and evening forecast chart, collect information on coastal area weather conditions to inform public to be prepared for heavy rain or cyclone, especially in disaster-prone areas.
Surprisingly, if there is no power supply, even the telephone connection of the director gets disconnected. "Probably, no other meteorological department director in the country would have used satellite communication as much as I had to do in the past one month due to lack of proper telecommunication service," he said.
"The department has more than 10 telephone lines, 20 computers and 50 staffers. This hindrance in communication service had severely affected work. We don't know what is causing the hindrance, maybe road-widening work," Muthuchami said.
Though they have been able to access internet for the past few days, problems related to telecommunication and power continue to haunt the department.