From Jodhpur to Hyderabad: 1,600-km-long thunderstorm covers India

Key points

• A massive band of thunderstorms stretching roughly 1,600 kilometres across India was captured by the India Meteorological Department's (IMD) INSAT-3DS satellite on Monday evening, highlighting the extraordinary scale of pre-monsoon weather activity currently sweeping the country.
• The latest thermal infrared satellite image shows a nearly continuous corridor of towering thunderclouds extending from western Rajasthan near Jodhpur through central India and down toward Telangana and Hyderabad.
• The sprawling cloud mass is part of a much larger weather pattern that has engulfed a significant portion of the Indian subcontinent.
• Meteorologists estimate that nearly 70-80 per cent of India is currently witnessing some form of thunderstorm or pre-monsoon cloud activity.
• The satellite imagery reveals dense cloud clusters over Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal, Jharkhand and parts of southern India, while another extensive cloud shield remains spread across the Himalayan region.