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A Wind That Turns Around Twice a Year
The word monsoon comes from the Arabic *mausim*, meaning season — not rain, which is the commonest wrong answer in the whole chapter. Arab sailors named the wind that reversed direction with the seasons, long before anyone explained it.
The engine is differential heating. Land heats faster than water. By May the plains of north-west India are baking and a strong low-pressure area forms there, while the Indian Ocean stays comparatively cool and high-pressure. Air rushes from the high to the low — from sea to land — and because that air has crossed thousands of kilometres of ocean, it arrives loaded with moisture. In winter everything reverses: the land cools faster, high pressure sits over the interior, and the wind blows out from land to sea, dry.
About 75% of India's annual rainfall falls in the four monsoon months from June to September. That is why a single bad season is a national economic event, not a weather report.
1. The word 'monsoon' comes from the Arabic word 'mausim', which means —
2. The south-west monsoon normally reaches the Kerala coast around —
3. Which place receives the highest average annual rainfall in India?
4. The coastal belt of Tamil Nadu receives most of its rainfall from —
5. Pune and the interior Deccan plateau receive far less rain than Mahabaleshwar because they lie —
6. El Niño refers to —
7. The India Meteorological Department calls the monsoon 'normal' when seasonal rainfall lies between —
8. The Bay of Bengal branch of the south-west monsoon is deflected towards the Ganga plain mainly by —