Cyclone Asna moves 500km away from Karachi, fishermen in Sindh told to resume activities

Cyclone Asna has moved 500 kilometres away from Karachi in the past 12 hours and is likely to move further southwestwards and weaken gradually, according to a notification from the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) issued on Sunday.

The cyclone now lies Northwest over the Arabian Sea and is 350km southwest of Ormara, 260km south of Gwadar and 430km east-southeast of Musqat, Oman.

Under influence of its circulation, “rain-thundershowers with a few heavy falls and accompanied with squally winds of 60-70Km/hour are likely in Ormara, Pasni, Gwadar, Jiwani and Turbat till this evening,” the notification said.

It further said that heavy rains may create localised water logging in low lying areas of the Makran coast, and that sea conditions are “likely to remain rough to very rough with squally winds of 60-70 Km/hour gusting 80Km/hour till tonight.”

While fishermen in Balochistan were advised not to venture in open sea till tonight, those of Sindh were given the green light to resume their activities from today.

According to the notification, PMD’s cyclone warning center in Karachi is closely monitoring the system and will issue an update accordingly.

On Thursday, Karachi Mayor Murtaza Wahab warned citizens against unnecessary movement as more rain was expected due to a potential cyclone over the Rann of Kutch in India, which was likely to emerge along the Sindh coast on Friday morning.

According to a PMD alert issued at 10pm on Thursday, a deep depression over the Rann of Kutch had very slowly moved west/southwest over the past 12 hours and lay around 250 kilometres east/southeast of Karachi.

On Friday, the deep depression was situated approximately 170 kilometres from Karachi, which made Pakistan’s coastal areas brace for rains as the storm system intensified into Cyclone Asna over the northeast Arabian Sea along Sindh’s coast.

On Saturday, Cyclone Asna steered away from Pakistan’s coastline — lying about 370 kilometres away from Karachi — but residents of Balochistan’s coastal belt still braced for expected rains brought by the weather system.