The 2017 North Indian Ocean cyclone season is a current event in the annual cycle of tropical cyclone formation.
On April 13, an area of low pressure formed in the South Bay of Bengal, under the influence of a persistent area of convection, in a span of six hours. Under favorable conditions, rapid deepening took place, and the system was classified as a depression on April 15. Later on the same day, it further intensified into a Deep Depression, then into Cyclonic Storm Maarutha.
Maarutha had already triggered heavy rainfall as a depression in Sri Lanka, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (India). On April 16, Maarutha made landfall on Myanmar, before dissipating to a well-marked low pressure area on the next day.
In Kyaukpyu, Maarutha destroyed more than 70 households and total damages were totaled up to Ks31.8 million (US$23,400). Three people were reported killed in Myanmar.
The names were selected by members of the ESCAP/WMO panel on Tropical Cyclones between 2000 and May 2004, before the Regional Specialized Meteorological Center in New Delhi started to assign names in September 2004.
There is no retirement of tropical cyclone names in this basin as the list of names is only scheduled to be used once before a new list of names is drawn up.
Should a named tropical cyclone move into the basin from the Western Pacific, then it will retain its original name.
The next six available names from the List of North Indian Ocean storm names are below:
Maarutha
Mora (unused)
Ockhi (unused)
Sagar (unused)
Mekunu (unused)
Daye (unused)