City to face bad weather during transitional span

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta residents will experience drastic climatic changes during the transitional period before the dry season, which begins end of April, an official said on Friday.

Waan Tarmin, a staff member at the public information department of the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG), said the city would be dominated by mostly hot weather and brief showers during the transitional period, which starts within the next few days.

"The weather will become hotter because the earth's temperature heats up due to the lack of clouds which protect the earth from the sun's direct rays," he told The Jakarta Post.

Waan said the condition was also influenced by the declining ocean temperature in the western part of the country from between 27 and 28 degrees Celsius to between 22 to 25 degrees Celsius.

"Since its temperature is lower than that of the earth's, which is between 32 to 33 degrees Celsius, the water evaporation process is hampered, causing a delay in the configuration of a cloud," he said.

The official said such conditions could last for about a month before the dry season, which runs from the end of April until the end of September.

Recently, the weather in the city has been noticeably changing each day with people suffering from unbearable heat with no clouds in sight. Sometimes there are brief intervals of rain, such as what happened in several areas on Friday.

The city had an unusually rainy wet season over the past three months, resulting in floods in several parts of the city.

Separately, the head of the city health agency, Achmad Harjadi, warned city residents of developing possible illnesses during the upcoming transition.

"Possible illnesses during this period will mainly affect our respiratory system, like coughs and flu. That's why people should pay more attention to their body, as it is the only way to avoid respiratory problems during the transition," he told the Post.

Achmad said the respiratory system was the main part of the body which was directly related to the intake of air, "so when the humidity changes during this period, the first part of our body which will be affected is our respiratory system".

Waan said BMG, however, had predicted that the upcoming dry season would not be so hot and that there would still be the occasional rain. (ind)