An increase in the Bay of Bengal’s sea surface temperature, along with rising ocean heat content, can trigger several changes in weather, marine life and coastal ecosystems, experts have said, while warning that it may also lead to more extreme weather events, including cyclones.Pratap K Mohanty, a researcher and retired professor of marine science, said cyclones draw their energy from warm ocean water. “Higher sea surface temperature (SST) means more heat and moisture are available to storms. As a result, cyclones can intensify more rapidly and become more destructive before landfall. The Bay of Bengal is already one of the most cyclone-prone regions and warmer waters increase this risk,” he added.“For a coastal state like Odisha, a warmer Bay of Bengal could mean more frequent high-intensity cyclones, increased extreme rainfall and floods, greater coastal erosion, risks to fisheries and livelihoods and more weather uncertainties affecting agriculture,” Mohanty said.Sandeep Patnaik, an associate professor at IIT, Bhubaneswar, said the characteristics of severe weather systems in the Bay have been changing in recent years.“Weather systems, especially deep depressions and cyclones, bring very heavy rainfall, or sometimes extremely heavy rainfall, to coastal and interior states of India. Normally, these weather systems form well inside the Bay of Bengal, then travel towards the coast and gradually intensify. However, recently, many weather systems have been spending more time near the coast, either intensifying or decaying. These changes are creating more challenges in predicting weather systems correctly due to the complex interactions between ocean, land and atmosphere, with storm dynamics often confusing even state-of-the-art weather models,” Patnaik added. He said variability in sea surface temperature is one of the key factors contributing to these problems.IMD scientist Umasankar Das said weather systems over the Bay are challenging to forecast because the basin combines a warm ocean, complex atmospheric circulation, rapid system evolution and strong land-sea interactions.“The Bay of Bengal generally maintains warm SSTs, often around 28°C to 30°C, providing abundant moisture to the surrounding atmosphere. Small changes in SST, ocean heat content and upper-ocean mixing can significantly affect intensification, which calls for stronger observing systems in data-sparse regions such as the Bay,” he added.