With only three days to go, the Republic Day preparations in the national capital Delhi are in full swing. In fact a more concerted effort is being made by the participants as Barack Obama, the President of the most powerful nation of the world is going to grace the occasion. It will be for the first time that an American president will be the guest of honour on the Republic day.
Keeping in view Obama’s visit, the security in the national capital has been heightened to great levels but one thing that we don’t have control over is, the weather. According to Skymet Meteorology division in India, Delhi is going to observe fog during early morning of January 26, which has mostly been the case in last ten years. The chill factor is also going to be a little of a bother for the US president. Though the temperature is expected to settle close to 9 degrees Celsius - normal for the month - when the parade starts, light cool winds will increase the chill.
Going by the historical data available with Skymet for last ten years, dense fog with visibility close to 200 meters was observed in 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009 and 2010. In 2013 slightly better conditions were observed with visibility recording close to 400 meters. Fog usually remains till 10 am and begins to clear thereafter.
One peculiar thing about the day is that rain has never played a spoilsport in the celebrations. Looking back at the available data, there hasn’t been a single year in a decade that rain was observed during the occasion. This year too we don’t expect rain during the event but light showers are expected during the evening hours.
