Bhubaneswar, Jan. 18: Dr. Sarat Chandra Sahu, Director of Centre for
Environment and Climate (CEC) of Siksha ‘O’ Anusandhan Deemed to be
University here has been honoured with the World Congress on Disaster
Management-Disaster Risk Reduction (WCDM-DRR) award instituted by the
Disaster Management Initiatives and Convergence Society-World Congress on
Disaster Management (DMICS-WCDM) at New Delhi on Wednesday.
Dr. Sahu, a renowned meteorologist who formerly worked with the Indian
Meteorological Department (IMD) as its Director at Bhubaneswar, received the
award from Union minister for Commerce and Industry Mr. Piyush Goyal at a
program organised at the Constitution Club of India.
He was presented the award in the category of Disaster Preparedness and
Sub-category of Innovations in Forecast and Early Warning System.
The CEC uses the Weather Research Forecasting (WRF) model products,
other global model products and locally observed parameters to prepare weather
forecast for significant events for Odisha which are supplied to registered users. It
also uses lightning detection system (LDS) data of the Indian Institute of Tropical
Meteorology (IITM), Pune, Earth Network, USA and National Remote Sensing
Centre, ISRO, Hyderabad to issue lightning and thunderstorm alerts block wise
which are transmitted to users through WhatsApp.
Besides, Ph.D students conduct research at the centre in the field of
meteorology on topics of climate, climate change, climate variability,
thunderstorm and lightning, monsoon variability and undertake analysis of past
tropical cyclones.
The award program was also attended by Justice M.M. Kumar, former Chief
Justice of Jammu and Kashmir and Chair, Jury Committee, WCDM-DRR Awards
and Dr. S. Ananda Babu, President and Convenor, DMICS-WCDM.
