History :

Meteorological Centre Chandigarh was established in 1980 and started functioning from 1st January, 1982. The office shifted to present location in Sector 39-C, Chandigarh in the year 2009.

Services :

This centre is rendering the meteorological services to the general public of the states of Haryana and Punjab and Union Territory of Chandigarh and various concerned departments of Central and State Governments like Agriculture, Irrigation, Disaster Management, Power, Flood Control, Water Management, Relief and Rehabilitation, Roadways, Tourism, Insurance, Railways etc. This office also supplies different types of Meteorological data and aviation services to various government departments and private parties on payment basis. This data is used by Farmers, Scientists for research purposes, Central Flood Forecasting Division of Central Water Commission, Air Force personnel, all airlines and general public to Newspapers, All India Radio, TV Channels and other media. Severe weather warnings, meteorological data archival and supply and Research & Development is also a part of the mandate of this office.

There are three Airport Meteorological Offices situated in Haryana and Punjab:

• Hisar Airport in Hisar, Haryana.
• Ludhiana Civil Airport in Ludhiana, Punjab
• Shri Guru Ram Das Ji International Airport in Amritsar, Punjab.

This Meteorological Centre deals with all forecasts related to the states of Haryana and Punjab and Union Territory of Chandigarh. This centre also inspects the departmental as well as non departmental observatories situated in the states of Haryana and Punjab along with rain reporting stations under different schemes (like DRMS, HMO and FMO) of India Meteorological Department.

A Doppler Weather RADAR (DWR) is functional at Patiala, Punjab to provide precise location and time specific warnings for heavy rainfall and strong winds on a short time scale. Upper air observations of temperature, wind, humidity and pressure using hydrogen filled balloon bound GPS based radiosonde with meteorological sensors are made twice along with pilot balloon observations on daily basis.

Mission :

To take meteorological observations and to provide current and past meteorological information, current weather and weather forecasts on various temporal and spatial scale for optimization of resources of weather-sensitive activities like agriculture, irrigation, aviation, power plants, planning, industrial operations, tourism, disaster management and other activities.

Objectives :

• Establishing, operating and maintaining a network of manual / automatic weather stations including synoptic, upper atmosphere, RADAR, radiation, climatological, agro meteorological observations.
• To record meteorological observations (surface, radar, radiation and upper atmosphere) of the states of Haryana and Punjab on different temporal and spatial scale through the manned and unmanned observatories and also to provide the current weather observations of all airports of the state.
• To provide nowcast, short range and medium range weather forecasts and other information to the users for aviation and non aviation purpose.
• To communicate the current and past meteorological information, forecast products and warnings to the public, aviation, industry, agriculture, tourism sector, Railways, state governments and its concerned bodies etc.
• To warn the public and disaster management authorities of the state government against severe weather phenomena like dust storms, heavy rains, frost, thunder, squall, cold and heat waves, etc., which cause destruction of life and property, effect social-economic activities and agriculture operations etc.
• To provide the QPF forecast of the catchments areas and formulate / disseminate a Hydromet Bulletin, Daily Rainfall Data and Flood Situation to concerned agencies like concerned State Government authorities, CWC, Flood Control Room, Defense, Railways etc. during monsoon season in the states of Haryana and Punjab and also the Union Territory of Chandigarh.
• Establishing, operating and maintaining a data bank of basic meteorological data and to provide climatological data and information required for agriculture, water resource management, industries, oil exploration, insurance covers, research and other nation-building activities.
• Conducting applied meteorological research to advance scientific understanding of weather and climate.
• Organise basic training in meteorology to the school / college students and also the research scholars.
• Quarterly / Annual / five year inspection of all the departmental / non departmental observatories, AWS/ARG network and manual Rain Gauge stations in the region to maintain the quality of meteorological observations.