Cyclone Chapala Rapidly Intensifies to a Category 4 Storm in Arabian Sea

Tropical Cyclone Chapala developed in the Arabian Sea on October 28 as the fourth tropical depression in the Northern Indian Ocean basin and on October 29, strengthened into a hurricane.

Forecasters are keeping a watchful eye on a rare and intensifying cyclone that has the potential to become the strongest storm on record in the Arabian Sea.

Winter in Pune usually sets in by the last week of October and the start of November.

"Because of the dry air from the Arabian desert and lower ocean thermal energy, we do expect it will weaken before it makes landfall", Nullis said, saying the storm would likely hit land as the equivalent as a category one hurricane, with winds of up to 160 kph.

The storm is now a Category 4 tropical cyclone, with maximum sustained winds of 150 miles per hour.

Joint Typhoon Warning Centre The projected path of Chapala indicates it will reach Yemen on Monday

Mr. Kashyapi said, "Rain occurred in many places in Jabalpur division while a few places in Rewa, Hoshangabad, and Chambal divisions during the past 24 hours". Meteorologists predict about eight years' worth of rain in the coastal areas of Oman and Yemen within two days.

You may wonder how often "tropical cyclone" and the "Arabian Peninsula" appear in the same sentence. The conflict has killed thousands of civilians and left the country, one of the poorest in the Middle East, with serious food security issues and dwindling medical supplies. "But even so there will be very high gale force winds in an area that is just not used to seeing this", said Clare Nullis, spokeswoman for the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). It reached a peak intensity that was equivalent to a Category 5 storm, with winds topping out around 167 miles per hour, according to records from the JTWC. But the cyclone's strong winds, big waves and heavy rainfall still managed to do $4.4 billion in damage to Oman and the United Arab Emirates.

The storm is forecast to make landfall in an area of Yemen that is sparsely populated, but it could have a big impact in Oman, where it is expected to hit the port city Salalah, which has a few 200,000 inhabitants.

Gonu was the closest a storm has come to entering the Persian Gulf, where no tropical cyclone has ever been observed.

While the trajectory of the cyclone sees the weather system steer clear of the UAE, Oman remains on alert, while warning residents to avoid the coastline and wades in lieu of possible flooding.