North Andhra’s Needed Rain Arrives as a Deep Depression

A Bay of Bengal depression lay 320 km east of Visakhapatnam on Tuesday morning, on course to cross as a deep depression from Wednesday night. The India Meteorological Department, in its 5:30 a.m. bulletin on September 22, placed the centre near 17.9 N, 86.3 E, about 220 km southeast of Gopalpur and 230 km east-southeast of Kalingapatnam.

North coastal Andhra has wanted this rain for months. District collectors still opened flood control rooms, because the same system is a deep depression pointed at a coast whose drains and river yards fail in every strong monsoon pulse.

The Depression Is Aimed at Visakhapatnam and Gopalpur

The system became a depression on Monday afternoon over the west-central and adjoining northwest Bay. At 5:30 p.m. on September 21 it lay near 17.7 N, 87.8 E, about 470 km east of Visakhapatnam and 310 km southeast of Puri. By Tuesday morning it had moved west-northwest at 17 kmph over the previous six hours.

IMD said it would become a deep depression within 12 hours and then cross between Visakhapatnam and Gopalpur during the night of September 23 and the early hours of September 24. That is later and more specific than the Wednesday-morning approach talked about while the system was still a well-marked low.

HOW THE BAY SYSTEM BUILT

1. September 19, 2026: A low-pressure area forms over the north Andaman Sea and starts moving west-northwest.
2. September 21, 5:30 p.m.: The system lies as a depression near 17.7 N, 87.8 E, 470 km east of Visakhapatnam.
3. September 22, 5:30 a.m.: The centre is near 17.9 N, 86.3 E, 320 km east of Visakhapatnam, and is forecast to become a deep depression within 12 hours.
4. Night of September 23 to early September 24: The system is forecast to cross the north Andhra-south Odisha coast between Visakhapatnam and Gopalpur as a deep depression.

Kalingapatnam, on Srikakulam’s coast, had already logged 5 cm of rain in the 24 hours to 5:30 a.m. on Tuesday. Visakhapatnam had been wet since Monday evening, after several hot, dry days, and Tuesday’s morning commute ran through waterlogged stretches in Madhurawada, Pendurthi, Maharanipeta and Seethammadhara.

THE SYSTEM AT 5:30 A.M. SEPTEMBER 22

• Centre: Near 17.9 N, 86.3 E, 320 km east of Visakhapatnam.
• Next step: Deep depression within 12 hours, then a coastal crossing from Wednesday night.
• Bay winds: 50 to 60 kmph, gusting to 70, on September 22, then 55 to 65 kmph, gusting to 75, from September 23 through the evening of September 24.
• Flash flood watch: Low to moderate risk on a few watersheds in Vizianagaram and Srikakulam until 5:30 a.m. on September 23.

Independent trackers spent Tuesday arguing over a slight southward nudge that would pin more of the rain on Visakhapatnam city. The official product still gives a corridor, not a street. What the maps agree on is a wet two days after the centre comes ashore, which is how Bay systems usually behave once they hit the Eastern Ghats.

Andhra’s 47% Rain Shortfall Meets This System

P.L.N. Murthy, director of the Visakhapatnam Cyclone Warning Centre, said on September 20 that the state’s rainfall deficit stood at 47%. If the forecast holds, he said, the system might cut that shortfall by at least 20%.

“If the forecast proves right, the system might bring down the rainfall deficit by at least 20 per cent. The current deficit as on date is 47 per cent,” Murthy said.

Visakhapatnam district was drier still. Andhra Pradesh Water Resources Information and Management System records show the district received 199.69 mm from June 1 to September 11 against a normal 479.49 mm, a 58% gap that emptied tanks and pulled down groundwater along the coast.

Vizianagaram’s paddy map is the farm version of the same hole. Paddy went into 20,760 hectares this kharif against a normal 100,251, and 24 of 27 mandals were short, after Joint Director of Agriculture V.T. Rama Rao’s department told growers to shift toward crops that drink less. Across the state, kharif sowing is about 200,000 hectares behind last year. Many of those farmers had already spent about ₹9,500 an acre on seed, fertiliser and labour.

Kanchupalli Satyam, a farmer in Cheepurupalli, said the canals there had dried up because Thotapalli, on the Nagavali, was not releasing water. September rain will not put a full paddy crop back into empty fields. It can still save standing maize and sugarcane, refill tanks, and put something in the ground for rabi.

Major reservoirs in Andhra Pradesh held 524 TMC against a full level of 1,014 TMC when Murthy spoke. In a September 19-20 review of Visakhapatnam’s own sources, Water Resources Minister Nimmala Rama Naidu said Yeleru held 10.2 TMC, including 6.1 TMC of dead storage, and that 300 cusecs a day were being pushed toward the city. The smaller city reservoirs were thinner.

VISAKHAPATNAM RESERVOIRS IN THE SEPTEMBER 19 REVIEW

G.V. Pallam Raju, Superintending Engineer for water supply at the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation, has said Meghadrigedda’s catchment needs about 40 cm of rain to fill. That is a useful number against IMD’s own rain bands: heavy rain is 64.5 to 115.5 mm, very heavy is 115.6 to 204.4 mm, and extremely heavy is 204.5 mm or more. A few extremely heavy pockets would do work that two dry months did not.

What the Orange and Red Warnings Cover

IMD Amaravati has north coastal Andhra on orange for isolated heavy to very heavy rain on Tuesday, September 22, covering Srikakulam, Parvathipuram Manyam, Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, Alluri Sitharama Raju, Anakapalli and Kakinada. The heavier punch is listed for September 23 and 24, when isolated extremely heavy falls on Wednesday and Thursday are likely over coastal Andhra Pradesh and Yanam, and red take-action warnings cover Kakinada, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Konaseema, East Godavari, West Godavari, Krishna and Eluru.

Orange stays on the northern belt those two days. Rayalaseema is outside the colour warnings. Thunderstorms with lightning are likely at isolated places over coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema, with gusty land winds of 40 to 50 kmph, gusting to 60, on Tuesday, and squally winds of 55 to 65 kmph along the south Odisha-north Andhra coasts on September 23 and 24. A thundersquall of 50 to 60 kmph, gusting to 70, is on the coastal Andhra sheet from September 23 to 25.

DISTRICT WARNINGS THROUGH SEPTEMBER 24

• Tuesday, September 22: Orange on Srikakulam, Parvathipuram Manyam, Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, Alluri Sitharama Raju, Anakapalli and Kakinada for isolated heavy to very heavy rain.
• September 23 and 24: Red take-action warnings on Kakinada, Konaseema, East Godavari, West Godavari, Krishna and Eluru for isolated extremely heavy rain; orange continues on the northern coastal districts.
• Flash flood: Low to moderate risk on a few Vizianagaram and Srikakulam watersheds until 5:30 a.m. on September 23, with the same class of watch on Gajapati, Ganjam, Nayagarh, Puri and Khurda in Odisha.
• Impact listed by IMD: Waterlogging, inundation and local flooding in low-lying areas, with isolated landslides or mudslides where soils are already wet.

People asking from Rajahmundry, Anakapalli and the Vijayawada belt whether this rain reaches them are not chasing a rumour. The red belt is the Godavari-Krishna strip, and rain often hangs inland after a Bay centre crosses. The official sheet still keeps the extreme amounts isolated, not widespread, which is the difference between a useful soaking and a river-in-the-street night.

Nagavali and Vamsadhara Will Rise First

Srikakulam District Collector Swapnil Dinakar Pundkar has a 190 km coastline from Pydibhimavaram to Ichchapuram to watch, but the first flood pulse, if it comes, will not start at the beach. It will start in the Odisha catchments of the Nagavali and the Vamsadhara and then show up at barrages on the Andhra side.

Those two east-flowing basins flood after Bay of Bengal depressions as a matter of record. A basin study drawing on Andhra Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority counts logged more than 12 flood events on the Nagavali and nine on the Vamsadhara. Gotta barrage on the Vamsadhara has had to dump tens of thousands of cusecs in past October systems; the last bad round, in October 2025, put low-lying mandals under water after inflows from the border hills.

As recently as late August, irrigation officers were treating any flow as good news. The rivers had been almost dry for about two and a half months under a weak monsoon, then picked up again when rain hit the Andhra-Odisha border. Thotapalli on the Nagavali and Gotta on the Vamsadhara both saw usable inflows after that break, which is why a September depression is being read as both a recharge and a test.

Pundkar told revenue and irrigation officers in every mandal to pass information up the chain and to move people from low-lying ground if water comes up. Vizianagaram Collector S. Ramsundar Reddy, with Joint Collector S. Sedhu Madhavan, ordered a three-day watch and opened a control room at the Collector’s office on 08922-236947.

The APSRTC Yard Floods Every Rainy Season

On Monday night Pundkar walked the low-lying APSRTC complex in Srikakulam town, a yard that goes under in a normal rainy season, and told municipal staff to clear the drains. That is the urban half of the same story as the empty reservoirs: the city cannot store the first burst, and it cannot drain it either.

The people living in low lying areas will be shifted to safe places if needed.

Swapnil Dinakar Pundkar, Srikakulam District Collector

Visakhapatnam’s Tuesday morning already showed the pattern at street scale. Water sat on potholed roads, motorists crawled, and schoolchildren went in raincoats. Maddilapalem, Hanumanthawaka and Adavivaram have been among the first corridors to pond when the city gets a hard shower.

The last time Meghadrigedda had to make an emergency release, during Cyclone Gulab in September 2021, water went into low-lying neighbourhoods, industrial land, Visakhapatnam International Airport and the INS Dega complex. A depression is not Gulab. It does not need to be, if the sluices and storm drains are in the same condition they were then.

Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu spent last week telling officials that Visakhapatnam would not be left short, pointing at Polavaram Left Main Canal water and at pumps ready to lift Yeleru’s dead storage. That is a two-year water plan. It does not clear a bus depot that floods on cue, and it does not put 80,000 hectares of unsown Vizianagaram paddy back into the ground this week.

Fishermen Are Told to Stay Ashore

Meteorological Centre Bhubaneswar, in its fishermen warning, told crews to keep boats off the coast until Thursday, covering the central Bay, the Odisha coast and the north Andhra coast through September 24. The Visakhapatnam Cyclone Warning Centre had already told Andhra crews to be in by the evening of September 20.

Seas are likely to be rough to very rough along the north Andhra, Odisha and West Bengal coasts through September 24. Squally weather of 45 to 55 kmph, gusting to 65, was listed off the north Andhra coast for Tuesday, rising to 50 to 60 kmph, gusting to 70, on September 23 and 24. That is fishing weather only in the sense that it ends the trip.

Port and swell notes in the coastal products have been milder than a cyclone sheet, which matches the official intensity: a deep depression, not a named storm. Some private trackers still floated a marginal cyclone and the name Arnab, a Bangladesh entry on the next-name list. IMD’s Tuesday morning bulletin did not take that step. Murthy had already said European and U.S. model maps showing a distorted eye did not prove a named cyclone.

Wednesday Night Is the Crossing Window

The operational window is now short and dated. Ramsundar Reddy’s three-day watch runs through the crossing. Pundkar’s drain-clearing order is for a yard that will not get a second chance if the Vamsadhara comes up while the town is still waterlogged. Fishermen are meant to be ashore until September 24, which is the evening after the centre is forecast to cross.

If the rain falls where the orange and red sheets say it will, Yeleru, Raiwada, Tatipudi and Meghadrigedda get a pulse they have not had since early summer, and the 47% state deficit moves. If the same rain sits on the Nagavali-Vamsadhara catchments and on Srikakulam’s bus yard, the control room on 08922-236947 will be taking the calls that every past Bay depression has taught these two districts to expect.

The centre is still over water. IMD’s clock for coming ashore is the night of September 23 into the early hours of September 24, between Visakhapatnam and Gopalpur, as a deep depression.