Cyclone Sitrang is moving up the Bay of Bengal towards the Bangladesh coast on Monday, 24 October 2022, and the Meteorological Department expects it to cross the coast late tonight with a storm surge of five to eight feet. It is already raining across most of the country and the wind is rising. If the power goes, your phone becomes the weather service. Here is where to look, and how to make it last.
Where the real information is
- Bangladesh Meteorological Department: live4.bmd.gov.bd shows the cyclone's current position and forecast track on a map, radar images, and the official warnings and instructions; bmd.gov.bd carries the special bulletins. BMD also has a free app, "BMD Weather", on Android and iOS.
- 1090: the department's toll-free voice line, in Bangla, which reads out the latest cyclone bulletin and river warnings. It works on any phone, including a feature phone with no data.
- Windy.com: the free app (Android and iOS) and website used by pilots and sailors worldwide, with animated wind, rain and pressure maps that make the cyclone's spiral and its predicted path obvious. Check the time stamp on the forecast model.
- The Weather Channel (weather.com and app) for a second opinion on the track, and satellite imagery you can zoom.
Treat Facebook forecasts, especially the ones with dramatic wind-speed numbers and no source, as entertainment.
Reading the signal number
Bangladesh's sea ports use a signal system that confuses everyone. Signals 1 to 4 are distant warnings; 5, 6 and 7 mean the port is threatened by a storm passing to one side; 8, 9 and 10 are "great danger" signals meaning a severe cyclone will cross near the port; 11 means communications with the warning centre have failed. River ports use 1 to 4. When the bulletin says Mongla and Payra are under signal 7 and Chattogram under 6, the numbers describe the port's position relative to the storm, not simply its strength.
Keeping the phone alive
- Charge everything now, including the power bank, while the grid is up.
- Switch to low-power mode and turn off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and background app refresh; drop the screen brightness.
- Use SMS rather than calls or WhatsApp for check-ins; a text gets through on a weak, congested network when nothing else does.
- Download the BMD bulletin or a screenshot of the track before the network drops, so you are not reloading a map on 2G at 2 am.
- Keep the phone in a sealed plastic bag with the charger; a wet phone is a dead phone, and rice will not help.
Update: Sitrang crossed the coast between Barishal and Bhola around midnight, weaker than feared, but killed at least 35 people, mostly from falling trees and walls, and left about eight million without power.
