Cyclone Arnab 2026: Track, Landfall, Name, UPSC Notes
A deep depression over the Bay of Bengal strengthened into Cyclone Arnab on 26 October 2026, and the IMD now expects it to cross the Andhra Pradesh coast between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam on 28 October. This page carries the tracker, the name's origin, the physics behind it, and every UPSC angle worth knowing.
Gajendra Singh Godara
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An India Meteorological Department bulletin on 26 October 2026 confirmed that a deep depression over the Bay of Bengal had strengthened into a cyclonic storm, now named Cyclone Arnab.
Further intensification is likely, with the IMD expecting the system to cross the Andhra Pradesh and Yanam coasts between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam by the forenoon of 28 October 2026, as a very severe cyclonic storm packing sustained winds of 115 to 125 kmph gusting to 140 kmph.
This is a developing system. Both track and intensity shift with each bulletin, so read the figures below as the picture on 26 October and check the newest IMD advisory before you rely on them.
Strengthened to cyclonic storm status on 26 October 2026 over the east-central Bay of Bengal
Expected landfall between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam on the forenoon of 28 October
Forecast winds of 115 to 125 kmph, gusting to 140 kmph
Name "Arnab" proposed by Bangladesh, meaning sea or ocean
Andhra Pradesh has 10 NDRF and 11 SDRF teams on standby; Odisha has mobilised 225 rescue teams across five districts
Over 4,800 fishing boats have returned to the Kakinada coas
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Few coastlines on earth see as many cyclones as the stretch from Bapatla to Visakhapatnam, and the recent record is what explains both the alarm and the preparation.
Cyclone | Year | What Happened |
Odisha Super Cyclone | 1999 | Winds near 260 kmph; around 10,000 deaths, the worst in India's recorded cyclone history |
Phailin | 2013 | Comparable strength, but fewer than fifty deaths after the largest peacetime evacuation India had then undertaken |
Hudhud | 2014 | Made landfall at Visakhapatnam; severe urban damage, but deaths in the dozens rather than thousands |
Fani | 2019 | Hit Odisha in May; over a million people evacuated in advance |
Montha | 2025 | Crossed the Andhra coast near Kakinada in late October, on almost the same track Arnab is now expected to follow |
Read that column of numbers downwards and the pattern is hard to miss. Wind speeds have held steady. Deaths have fallen sharply.
The difference is longer forecast lead times and a willingness among state governments to move people out before a storm arrives, instead of pulling them from rubble after one.
Cyclone Montha is the comparison that matters most. Its late-October 2025 crossing of this same coast means district administrations in Andhra Pradesh and Odisha are running a drill they already rehearsed twelve months ago. Shelters, routes and relief chains are mapped.
Date | Stage |
Before 26 October | Low pressure area, then depression, then deep depression over the east-central and south-east Bay of Bengal |
26 October 2026 | Intensified into Cyclone Arnab, moving west-northwestwards at about 15 kmph |
27 October 2026 | Expected to become a severe cyclonic storm over the west-central Bay of Bengal |
28 October 2026 (forenoon) | Expected landfall as a very severe cyclonic storm between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam |
28 to 30 October 2026 | Extremely heavy to heavy rainfall forecast over southern Odisha, with thunderstorms and squally weather |
Pending: every IMD bulletin updates track and intensity. The landfall window, the exact crossing point and the final category can all move.
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The name "Arnab" was proposed by Bangladesh and means "sea" or "ocean" in Bengali. The IMD pronounces it "Ornab".
This is where aspirants are most likely to be quizzed, so sit with the system behind the name.
Feature | Detail |
Who names cyclones here | The WMO/ESCAP Panel on Tropical Cyclones, for the north Indian Ocean |
Member countries | 13: Bangladesh, India, Iran, Maldives, Myanmar, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, UAE and Yemen |
Current list | Adopted in April 2020, with 13 names from each country, 169 in all |
Who issues the name | RSMC New Delhi, run by the IMD |
Order | Names are used in sequence, country by country in alphabetical order of the country |
Why cyclones get names in the first place
Numbers and coordinates travel badly. A single name does not. Say "Arnab" in a warning and fishermen, district collectors, reporters and relief agencies all know exactly which system is being discussed.
When two systems can sit in the same basin at once, that one word saves lives.
RSMC New Delhi is worth filing away separately. India runs one of six Regional Specialised Meteorological Centres worldwide, and this one covers the whole north Indian Ocean, which takes in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. Its advisories go out to all 13 member countries, not just India.
A tropical cyclone is a rotating storm system built over warm ocean water, with low pressure at the centre, high winds and heavy rain.
In this region it is called a cyclone. In the Atlantic it is a hurricane. In the north-west Pacific it is a typhoon.
Six conditions have to line up.
Condition | Why It Matters |
Warm sea surface, about 26.5°C or more to a depth of 50 metres | Supplies the heat and moisture that power the storm |
Coriolis force | Gives the system its spin. Cyclones do not form within about 5 degrees of the equator, where this force is nearly zero |
Low vertical wind shear | Strong shear tears the growing storm apart before it organises |
Pre-existing disturbance | Gives the system something to build on |
Upper-level divergence | Pulls air out at the top, keeping the low pressure at the surface |
High mid-level humidity | Dry air entering the core weakens it |
Rotation in the north Indian Ocean runs anticlockwise, because Coriolis deflection in the Northern Hemisphere pushes it that way.
For practice, try this question on sea surface temperature and cyclone formation.
IMD cyclone classification
This table shows up in question papers.
Category | Maximum Sustained Wind Speed |
Low pressure area | Below 31 kmph |
Depression | 31 to 49 kmph |
Deep depression | 50 to 61 kmph |
Cyclonic storm | 62 to 87 kmph |
Severe cyclonic storm | 88 to 117 kmph |
Very severe cyclonic storm | 118 to 166 kmph |
Extremely severe cyclonic storm | 167 to 221 kmph |
Super cyclonic storm | 222 kmph and above |
Put Arnab on this scale yourself. At 115 to 125 kmph it sits on the line between severe and very severe, which is why the IMD has pegged it as a very severe cyclonic storm at landfall.
What Actually Happens at Landfall
Landfall is the moment the storm's centre crosses the coast, and three things tend to arrive together.
The eyewall. A cyclone carries a calm eye at the centre, ringed by the eyewall, where wind and rain hit hardest.
Wind damage comes from the eyewall, and this is why a brief lull mid-cyclone is dangerous. The eye is overhead. The other half of the eyewall has not arrived yet.
Storm surge. The storm pushes seawater towards the shore, and the sea rises with it. Surge is historically the biggest killer in Bay of Bengal cyclones.
Hit the coast at high tide, up a narrowing shoreline, and water can push kilometres inland. The 1999 Odisha disaster was mostly a surge disaster.
Rainbands. Spiral cloud bands trail far behind the centre. That is why southern Odisha is under an extremely heavy rainfall warning even though landfall is forecast well to its south. Inland flooding often rolls on for days after the winds have died.
For Cyclone Arnab, the IMD's 115 to 125 kmph wind forecast points to structural damage near the crossing point, while the heavy rainfall warning spreads across a much wider patch than the landfall zone itself.
Roughly four cyclones form in the Bay of Bengal for every one in the Arabian Sea. Four reasons explain the imbalance.
Reason | Explanation |
Warmer and shallower water | The Bay stays warmer for longer, and its shallow northern end heats quickly |
Freshwater from rivers | The Ganga, Brahmaputra, Mahanadi and Godavari pour in fresh water, which sits on top as a less salty layer. This "barrier layer" stops cooler water from mixing up and keeps the surface warm |
Position of the ITCZ | The Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone sits over the Bay for longer, supplying the disturbances cyclones grow from |
Remnants of Pacific systems | Weakening typhoons from the South China Sea cross into the Bay and can reorganise |
Geography compounds all of that. Towards the north the Bay narrows into a funnel, so a surge pushed up it has nowhere to spread, which is why the Odisha, West Bengal and Bangladesh coasts take such destructive surges.
Season. Two cyclone seasons run in India: pre-monsoon from April to June, and post-monsoon from October to December.
The post-monsoon season brings the stronger storms, and late October is its peak. Arnab is on schedule.
The Climate Change Question
One sentence in every answer on cyclones should sit here, written carefully.
Sea surface temperatures across the north Indian Ocean have been climbing, and warmer water carries more energy for a storm to draw on.
Research now links this to a rise in rapid intensification, where a system jumps several categories inside a day.
That is a forecasting problem as much as a physical one, because it eats into the warning window India's whole evacuation machinery depends on.
The honest caveat: scientists are more confident about the trend in intensity than about any change in the total number of cyclones, and no forecaster will attribute a single storm like Cyclone Arnab to climate change. Write "consistent with the observed trend", not "caused by".
Everything else flows from the Cyclone Arnab landfall forecast, so read it carefully.
A forecast landfall "between Bapatla and Visakhapatnam" is not a dot on a map; it is a 350 km stretch of coast. That width captures real uncertainty two days out, and it is why districts across the entire stretch, including the Konaseema, Yanam and Kakinada belt, are preparing rather than only those sitting on the central line.
The forenoon timing also counts. Managing a daylight landfall is far easier than a night one, since evacuation, rescue and damage checks all work better by day. Montha crossed at night in 2025, which complicated the response.
Officials spend the final 24 hours watching for two things: any sign the storm is still intensifying close to the coast, and whether it slows down. A slow cyclone dumps far more rain over the same ground, and a wind event turns into a flood event.
Expected impacts
Impact | What It Means on the Ground |
Heavy rainfall and flooding | Extremely heavy rain forecast over southern Odisha, with waterlogging in low-lying areas |
Wind damage | Winds up to 140 kmph can bring down trees, weak structures and overhead power lines |
Agriculture | Standing paddy and vegetable crops face lodging and waterlogging just before harvest |
Power supply | Andhra Pradesh utilities have positioned staff, machinery and materials with control rooms on standby |
Fishing and coastal livelihoods | Fishing suspended; over 4,800 boats returned to the Kakinada coast |
Transport | Road movement, rail services and port operations are likely to be disrupted |
Displacement | Residents of low-lying coastal settlements may need to move to relief shelters |
Preparedness and the Warning System
Measure | Status |
Andhra Pradesh | 10 NDRF teams and 11 SDRF teams available for rescue and relief |
Odisha | 225 rescue teams mobilised across five vulnerable districts |
IMD | Red warning for extremely heavy rainfall in five Odisha districts on 28 October |
Fisheries | Fishing suspended, boats recalled to harbour |
Utilities | Control rooms set up for power restoration |
IMD colour codes
Colour | Meaning |
Green | No warning; no action needed |
Yellow | Be aware; watch the situation |
Orange | Be prepared; authorities should get ready to respond |
Red | Take action; severe weather likely |
UPSC has set a Mains question directly on these colour codes, so learn all four.
Element | Detail |
Disaster Management Act, 2005 | The parent law; enacted using Entry 23 of the Concurrent List, since disaster management is not a separate entry in the Seventh Schedule |
NDMA | National Disaster Management Authority, chaired by the Prime Minister |
SDMA and DDMA | State authority under the Chief Minister, district authority under the District Magistrate |
NDRF | National Disaster Response Force, constituted under Section 44 of the Act |
NDRF and SDRF funds | Financing for response, with allocations shaped by Finance Commission recommendations |
NCRMP | National Cyclone Risk Mitigation Project, which built cyclone shelters and early warning systems along the east coast |
IMD | Under the Ministry of Earth Sciences; runs the cyclone warning system and Doppler radars |
INCOIS | Issues sea-state, storm surge and high-wave advisories |
Mission Mausam | Scheme to upgrade India's weather observation and forecasting capability |
Sendai Framework, 2015-2030 | Global agreement on disaster risk reduction, which India has adopted |
Brush up on the wider topic over on the geography section.
A fair answer carries both halves.
The success story is real. Around 10,000 people died in the 1999 Odisha super cyclone. Cyclone Phailin in 2013, of comparable strength, killed fewer than fifty, after the largest peacetime evacuation India had then run.
Early warning, cyclone shelters and practised evacuation drills did that work. The United Nations has repeatedly pointed to India's cyclone warning system as a model.
The gains, though, are uneven.
Gap | Why It Persists |
Deaths down, damage not | Evacuation saves lives but cannot protect crops, houses, boats and power lines |
Recovery is slow | Restoring livelihoods after a cyclone takes months, and compensation often lags |
Rising intensity | Warmer seas are linked to more rapid intensification, which shortens warning time |
Forecast limits | Track forecasts have improved more than intensity forecasts, and rapid intensification remains hard to predict |
Last-mile warning | Reaching migrant workers, fishermen at sea and remote hamlets is still the weakest link |
Shelter maintenance | Cyclone shelters built under NCRMP need upkeep and clear management between events |
And a counter-view on evacuation itself. Mass evacuation is costly and disruptive, and repeated moves for storms that weaken before landfall can breed complacency.
Officials have to weigh the cost of a false alarm against the cost of being wrong the other way, and most agree the second mistake is far worse.
Measure | Why |
Invest in intensity forecasting | Rapid intensification near the coast is the biggest remaining danger |
Strengthen last-mile communication | Local language alerts, sirens, community volunteers and boat-to-shore radio |
Move from relief to resilience | Cyclone-resistant housing, underground cabling in coastal towns, raised shelters |
Protect natural defences | Mangroves and sand dunes blunt storm surge, as Odisha's coast has shown |
Make insurance work | Crop and asset insurance that actually pays out quickly after a cyclone |
Strengthen district capacity | DDMAs need trained staff and funds, not just a plan on paper |
Confusing the wind-speed bands. The band most aspirants trip over is the jump from severe (88 to 117 kmph) to very severe (118 to 166 kmph). Arnab sits right on that line, which makes it a strong candidate for a question.
Thinking cyclones can form on the equator. They cannot. Within about 5 degrees of the equator the Coriolis force is nearly zero, so there is nothing to give a system its spin.
Reading the country from the name. Bangladesh proposed "Arnab", but the storm is forecast to hit India. Names rotate through the 13 panel countries, whatever coast the storm ends up on.
Treating landfall as the finish line. Rainbands and inland flooding often cause more cumulative damage than the landfall winds, and they continue for days after.
Mixing up IMD and NDMA. The IMD forecasts and warns. The NDMA, state authorities and NDRF handle the response. Different ministries, different roles.
Stage | Angle |
Prelims | IMD classification and wind speeds, naming system and the 13-country panel, RSMC New Delhi, colour codes, conditions for cyclone formation, DM Act bodies |
GS Paper 1 | Geophysical phenomena, cyclones, climatology, important geophysical features |
GS Paper 3 | Disaster and disaster management, early warning systems |
Mains | Why fatalities have fallen but losses have not |
Interview | Should coastal regulation rules be tightened after repeated cyclones? |
Frequently asked question (FAQs)
Where will Cyclone Arnab make landfall?
Who gave the name Cyclone Arnab?
How strong is Cyclone Arnab expected to be?
Which states will Cyclone Arnab affect?
Why does the Bay of Bengal get more cyclones than the Arabian Sea?
Cyclone Arnab has arrived at the peak of the post-monsoon season, on a stretch of coast that has been through this before.
The forecast hands the administration roughly two days of lead time, and that single number is the biggest reason Indian cyclones now kill far fewer people than they once did.
For the exam, carry four things out of this piece: the IMD wind-speed classification, the naming system and RSMC New Delhi's role, why the Bay of Bengal is more cyclone-prone than the Arabian Sea, and the gap between falling deaths and continuing damage. That last one is where the Mains marks are.
Sources: India Meteorological Department bulletins dated 26 October 2026, including the RSMC and Bhubaneswar unit statements; Andhra Pradesh and Odisha state disaster management updates; Disaster Management Act, 2005.
Both lead straight into this news. The first is the warning system now running for Arnab. The second is the natural barrier that softens storm surge along the same coast.
More: UPSC PYQ collection.
Mains Questions
Gajendra Singh Godara
Ex-UPSC Aspirant | Exam Preparation Expert
Gajendra Singh Godara is an IIT Bombay graduate and a UPSC aspirant with 4 attempts, including multiple Prelims and Mains appearances. He specializes in Polity, Modern History, International Relations, and Economy. At PadhAI, Gajendra leverages his firsthand exam experience to simplify complex concepts, creating high-efficiency study materials that help aspirants save time and stay focused.
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