The hilly city of Shimla observes three winter months, namely December, January as well as February. During this period, wintry weather conditions are observed over the capital city of Shimla with minimums being on the lower side.
As far as snowfall activity is concerned, the city of Shimla records snowfall during the fag end of the year. So much so that Shimla even sees a white Christmas or a snowy new year.
However, this year was quite different, and Shimla saw its first spell of winter snow around December 12 itself. Thereafter, the weather became dry over the city. In fact, throughout the month of December, there was no snow show over Shimla.
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The month of January also remained mostly dry except around January 22 when snowfall activity was observed in Shimla. Thereafter, dry weather once again took over.
However, after a gap of about 20 days, snowfall activity once again commenced over Shimla, all thanks to the active Western Disturbance over Western Himalayan region.
This snow event over Shimla has been of around 48 hours, which is the first prolonged snow spell of the season. Moreover, snowfall activity has been on the heavier side this time.
Thus, due to snow show and cloudy weather, minimums today have witnessed a significant drop. In fact, on February 11, minimum settled at 4.6 degrees Celsius, and reduced to 1.1 degrees Celsius yesterday. Today, the minimum dropped to freezing point at 0 degree Celsius.
It has only been the second time of the season when the minimum has dropped to freezing point. The last time the city saw such low minimums was on January 23 at -0.4 degrees Celsius.
Usually, Shimla does not witness minimums on the negative side in December. It is only during in January and February that Shimla observes sub zero minimums unlike other hilly stations that observe such low minimums in December itself.
As far as the rain amounts are concerned, Shimla recorded 12.8 mm of rain in January against its average of 53 mm. Talking about February, Shimla has so far witnessed 19.1 mm against its averaged of 63.8 mm, out of which 14 mm was recorded in the last 24 hours.
Now, as per weathermen at Skymet Weather, the rainy spell is expected to continue over the city of Shimla today. Thereafter, the Western Disturbance is expected to clear away after 24 hours. Isolated light rains may also appear tomorrow.
A fresh Western Disturbance is expected to affect the Western Himalayan region around February 15, however, it is not expected to make much of a dent in terms of weather over Himachal Pradesh and will affect Jammu and Kashmir.
Thus, next weekend is expected to be clear and sunny over the state of Himachal Pradesh inclusive of Shimla.
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Please Note: Any information picked from here must be attributed to skymetweather.com