People of Munnar in Kerala need not be fearful of lightning anymore as the Centre has set up a high altitude observatory that will be able to give a forecast of lightning in the region so that people can take the necessary precautionary measures. The government has plans to establish eight such well-equipped stations between Kanyakumari and Mangalore in the Western Ghats.

 The secretary in the ministry of earth sciences Madhavan Rajeevan, who inaugurated the observatory on Friday affirmed that it would also provide a platform to the earth scientists to research on basic details of cloud formation.

Located at an altitude of 1820 meters above sea level, the observatory will be immensely helpful to scientists to study the impact of climate change on agriculture, fisheries, tourism, biodiversity and forestry sectors in the long run.

The state of the art equipment of the observatory will facilitate the measurement of not only the micro-physical properties of the clouds and rain but also environmental conditions such as the aerosols, wind, temperature and humidity.

Apart from Munnar, this facility is also present in Mahabaleshwar in Maharashtra since five years. This region gets more than 500 cm of rain in a year and the observatory enables to conduct cutting-edge research in physics and the study of dynamics of clouds and rain.