Hailstorm in the month of Falgun

What a shower or two can do to make a spectacular difference in a place was best illustrated by the untimely hailstorm that lashed the city from nowhere. The heavenly white balls piling on streets, lawns and pavements presented an unearthly sight to behold. Leaves, both dry and lively green, of trees often with the tender branches with twigs came tumbling down when hit by larger chunks of hails. The hailstorm lasted for a brief period but its impact was particularly discernible because the creepers on the walls and leaves fell like nine pins and gathered in thick heaps.

The Ramna Park presented a strange sight with branches of trees looking bare, forlorn and ravaged by a monster in anger. On the eastern side of the High Court premise the boundary wall suffered the worst infliction when a not-so-big a tree was uprooted by the gale and caused damage to the iron railing and the beautifully crafted brick pillars. A large segment of the boundary wall fell. One wonders why so many pillars also failed to withstand the impact. Clearly, the pillars were simply constructed without its base going deep enough under the soil. The large billboards too suffered with the shiny laminated sheets blown away leaving the frames in a sorry state.

On the Bangla calendar, it is only the month of mid Falgun, so rains are least expected at this time of the year. Yet the sky remained overcast for a couple of days before finally the sky gave in. What is however remarkable is that the rains did not fall all over the country --not even in all areas of the capital. The western part of the city experienced sparse rains, not hailstorm, that barely subdued the dust most profuse at this time.  

Someone coming from the western part of the city to its centre could not but be puzzled by the eerie sight of the surroundings. Everything appeared to be so strange because of the havoc wreaked by the hailstorm. If it was just a passing shower in some areas, in others the white flakes raining down from the sky came as a surprise. Outside of the city, in areas where Rabi crops and vegetables are now in lush growth, this can be most damaging. After all, a large proportion of supplies of such items come from the adjoining areas of the city.  

A passing shower, of course is highly beneficial for the citizens of the capital where air quality is already very poor and in this dry season dust swirl around crazily. A study has found that metal particles floating with dust are responsible for a number of diseases, some of them not just seasonal but highly deadly. So along with controlling dust, the cooling effect of showers is highly welcome to the city dwellers. Prior to the rain and hailstorm, the weather was growing unusually hot but the rains have somewhat tempered the heat.

Now the rising temperature which was a record in 2015 that beat the record of the previous year owes, according to weather people and ecologists, to the El Nino blowing in the Pacific Ocean. It has been responsible for frequent tornados in the Americas and unprecedented floods in a few countries of Latin America. Can it have a role as well in the capricious behaviour of weather already encountered in this part of the world? According to experts, the unusual rate of rise in temperature will cause the sea level rise more rapidly than before and cities like Dhaka, Chittagong and Kolkata will disappear under water. Not a good prospect for the Bangalees on both sides of the divide.

If the hailstorm is any sign, there are more such abrupt phenomena to take people in this land off guard. Preparations for the global warming looks like more urgent than the Paris summit on the subject made people to believe. More needs to be done if people on this planet want to live without suffering a disproportionate level of hostility from mother Nature.