Minimum temperatures usually start dropping in northwestern plains by second or third week of December. Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and West Uttar Pradesh see frequent formation of moderate to dense fog by this time, with visibility dropping to poor levels.
In the last few days, dense layer of fog has taken over the entire region of Northwest India, largely affecting rail, road and air traffic. On December 20, due to nil visibility, many flights were diverted, canceled or delayed across Northwest India.
At present, the layer of fog can be seen right from Punjab to East India, dropping visibility to 0 meters in Amritsar during early morning hours today. Lucknow has recorded visibility of 100 meters while Delhi 500 meters between 6:30 and 9:00 am today.
A significant drop in the day temperatures has also been noticed, leading to cold day conditions. (cold day is considered when maximums are 16 degrees or less).
Moderate icy cold winds from northwest direction have been blowing over Northwest India, responsible for keeping the temperatures low. So much so that cold day conditions and winter chill have gripped many parts of Punjab, Haryana, North Rajasthan and a few parts of Delhi and NCR.
Just like maximums, the night temperatures too have been touching lower degrees for the last many days now. Mercury has dropped as low as 1.7˚C in Narnaul (Haryana) today morning, followed by Churu 3.5˚C, Pilani 3.9˚C and Alwar 4.0˚C.
According to our meteorologists, a marginal drop in minimums would be observed in parts of Northwest India during the next 24 to 48 hours. The low minimums might lead to commencement of cold wave conditions in one or two parts of Punjab, Haryana and North Rajasthan.
Although visibility over Palam in Delhi has improved a bit during the last 24 hours owing to an increase in wind speed, due to upper-level haze, the day temperatures are still low. Thus, no relief from cold day conditions would be observed for another 48 hours.
Moderate to dense fog is likely to appear tomorrow as well which might impact road traffic of entire region. Amritsar and adjoining areas might record nil visibility.
Image Credits – NDTV
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