Emerging trend in the east-west Dipole Pattern in Indian Summer Monsoon Rainfall and the associated impact on Regional Dynamics

TL;DR

This study identifies a recent east-west dipole pattern in Indian Summer Monsoon rainfall, linked to atmospheric and oceanic changes, indicating a shift in traditional monsoon rainfall distribution with regional impacts.

Contribution

It uncovers a distinct east-west rainfall dipole pattern using EOF analysis and links it to atmospheric and oceanic factors, revealing a new aspect of monsoon variability.

Findings

East-west rainfall dipole pattern identified via EOF mode 3.

Increased moisture and convection over the Arabian Sea region.

Contrasting pressure and SST trends over Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal.

Abstract

Traditionally, during the monsoon season, more rainfall is received along the Western Ghats, the Northern Gangetic plains, the central belt, and northeast India. However, recently, there has been a shift in this canonical monsoon rainfall pattern on the monthly to seasonal scale. In this study, we quantify an east-west asymmetric trend in monthly to seasonal rainfall due to the increased rainfall over the northwestern part of the country. An Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis has been performed to understand the spatial and temporal variation of the monsoon. EOF mode 3 shows such a distinct east-west dipole pattern, highlighting the existence of a modal feature representing the recent trend in the rainfall distribution. The physical nature of this mode is also established. The regression pattern of the rainfall anomalies to the Webster-Yang Index (Webster and Yang, 1992) exhibits a similar east-west pattern that further confirms the physical existence of this east-west rainfall modal dipole pattern. Since rainfall across the northwest is directly linked to the Arabian Sea and rainfall over the eastern region to the Bay of Bengal, the characteristics of these two regions are studied separately. Over the Arabian Sea, there is a significant negative trend in the Sea Level Pressure (SLP) anomalies and an increase in the specific humidity, causing greater moisture convergence. In contrast, over the Bay of Bengal, the SLP shows an increasing trend. The SST warming over the Arabian Sea is higher than that of the Bay of Bengal. Further, while investigating the zonal wind(u) at 850hPa, it shows an increasing trend along the northern branch that is more directed towards the northwestern part of the country. These factors together create dynamically favorable conditions for enhanced convection and thus receive more rainfall across the northwest compared to the northeast India.