The Sri Lanka Meteorological Association has responded to allegations made by government-affiliated parties claiming that the Department of Meteorology failed to properly inform the government and the public about Cyclone Ditva, which caused significant loss of life and property.
In a statement issued by the Deputy Secretary of the Sri Lanka Meteorological Association, C. G. Premachandra, it was stated that the Department of Meteorology issued announcements and official statements regarding the adverse weather conditions on 25 occasions since November 23.
The association emphasized that the allegations made by certain parties are baseless, and further stated that it has released, one by one, all announcements issued since the 27th through its official statement to demonstrate the actions taken by the department.
The concluding section of the statement issued by the association reads as follows:
“In view of the above, we would like to emphasize that the meteorologists of the Department of Meteorology issued appropriate warnings and alerts to the relevant stakeholders and the general public in accordance with established operational procedures, even before the development of Cyclone Ditva. These actions enabled the fishing and maritime communities to be protected from the risks posed by these weather systems. However, we believe that the warning process of the Department of Meteorology needs to be further improved from its current state in order to better identify extreme weather events, which are becoming increasingly uncertain due to climate change. In this regard, we wish to inform that a detailed study is currently being carried out to identify the weaknesses that existed at the time of this disaster.”
