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As the storm travels east, intense rainfall is also expected to continue in India, raising the possibility of flooding in the region. To date, the Indian states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Andhra Pradesh have been hit the hardest.

And things are likely to get worse before they get better: experts say Roanu will gain strength and become a severe cyclonic storm as it traverses the Bay of Bengal, with winds reaching speeds of 90 to 115 km per hour.

Reprieve isn’t expected until late in the weekend.

In an update issued Friday morning, the India Meteorological Department said the storm is supposed to taper off and become a tropical depression sometime early Sunday morning.

The relatively slow pace at which the storm is moving spells trouble for the region.

“In general, the rainfall potential of a tropical cyclone is not a function of its intensity (i.e. maximum sustained winds), but rather its forward speed,” reports the Weather Channel. “Some of the most extreme rainfall events worldwide have occurred when tropical cyclones, in some cases as weak as depressions or even remnant lows, move slowly, or stall.”

As the cyclone reaches land over the weekend, flooding remains the biggest threat posed by Roanu, a meteorologist told AccuWeather. In southern Bangladesh and in parts of India, precipitation is expected to total between 150 to 300 millimetres.

In other parts of India, officials have issued a severe heat alert as temperatures reach record highs. On Thursday, the city of Phalodi, in the western state of Rajasthan, saw temperatures reach 51 degrees Celsius.

Part of the reason, according to AccuWeather, is that Cyclone Roanu has pulled in warm, dry air from across western India, causing intense heat in drought-stricken regions of the country.

The arrival of the seasonal monsoon, a wind system that reverses direction around every six months, will help alleviate the heat during the first week of June.