Bhubaneswar: Odisha will draft a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for lightning safety and a comprehensive action plan for 2027 at a two-day national workshop beginning Thursday, aimed at reducing lightning-related deaths and strengthening community preparedness.
The workshop will propose a “Lightning-Safe Odisha: 2027 Action Plan and 2027-2030 Roadmap”, focusing on coordinated efforts in forecasting, risk reduction, public awareness, early warning dissemination and emergency response.
The initiative aims to bridge the gap between scientific research, government planning, and grassroots implementation to prevent avoidable deaths and protect vulnerable communities from lightning hazards.
The workshop will bring together experts from national scientific and technical institutions, universities, disaster management agencies, research organisations and district administrations to strengthen lightning detection, forecasting, risk assessment and early warning systems.
It will deliberate on scientific, technological and administrative interventions to minimise lightning-related fatalities and damage, with particular emphasis on protecting farmers, agricultural labourers, outdoor workers, students and people living in high-risk areas.
The first day will focus on improving lightning detection, monitoring and forecasting through satellite data, numerical weather prediction, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML) and panchayat-level decision-support systems.
The second day will focus on ground-level measures to prevent lightning-related deaths and injuries, including a risk mitigation roadmap for Odisha, identification of high-risk hotspots, risk mapping, farmer-specific risk assessments, lightning protection standards, low-cost shelters and emergency care for lightning strike victims.
Experts from the India Meteorological Department (IMD), Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), National Centre for Earth Science Studies (NCESS), National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF), IIT Bhubaneswar, Climate Resilient Observing Systems Promotion Council (CROPC) and Cape Electric will share their expertise.
