Atmosphere Journal Entry

Atmosphere Journal Entry

India Still Baking Under Killer Heatwave (June 6, 2003)

India continued baked under an intense heatwave this week. The death toll from the recent spell of hot weather has now passed 1,300. The heat is taking a particularly heavy toll in the scorched southern state of Andra Pradesh, where temperatures soared as high as 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit).

Most of the victims are poor people wih little or no shelter from the heat. Andra Pradesh has one of the highest concentrations of poor people in the country. About 12 million people are living below what the Indian government considers the poverty line.

The situation is a little better in the northern part of the country, where some seasonal monsoon rain finally began falling. The states of Assam, Manipur, Nagaland, Mizoram, and Arunachal Pradesh all got moisture from the season's first wave of monsoon rains. India's monsoon season runs from early June through September as wave after wave of humid air rolls in from the warm waters of the Bay of Bengal. Weather forecasters say the rains are likely to spread to the parched southern part of the country over the next couple of days.

The heatwave has also taken a toll in neighboring Pakistan, where 50 people have died, and in Bangladesh, where 62 others lost their lives.