Weatherman forecasts fall in temperatures in Bihar next week

PATNA: It’s time to take out the woollens as cold westerlies started blowing in the region on Saturday and weathermen predict fall in mercury in the coming days. The weathermen also predicted shallow to moderate fog in early morning hours during the peak winter season.
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“Maximum and minimum temperatures are likely to fall by at least two to three degrees C across the state over the next few days due to the influence of cold and dry westerly winds,” said an official at Patna meteorological centre.
The Met office says the minimum temperature is likely to drop to 12 degrees C in Patna by December 3, while the maximum temperature may come down to 26 degrees C.
Drop in mercury was witnessed on Saturday itself as the maximum temperature came down from 29 degrees C on Friday to 28.6 degrees C and minimum temperature came down from 16 degrees C to 15.4 degrees C.
“Temperature will now keep gradually plunging, which will result in colder days and nights. People may also feel slight chill brought by the westerlies,” the Met official said, adding that westerlies were blowing at an average speed of around 6kmph in Patna on Saturday.
The official said the temperature will plunge comparatively more in north Bihar. “The minimum temperature at Araria dropped from 31 degrees C on Friday to 28 degrees C on Saturday. The drop in temperature in entire north Bihar is likely to be a bit higher,” he said.
Deliberating upon the expected foggy conditions, the Met official said: “We are expecting shallow to moderate fog at isolated places in the state in the early morning hours. The visibility at around 6am in Patna was around 800-900 metres, which may drop with the onset of foggy conditions.”
Patna air quality improves, but remains ‘very poor’: The air quality index (AQI) of Patna came down from 377 on Friday to 312 on Saturday but the air in the state capital was still in the ‘very poor’ category. Patna was third in terms of poor air quality in the list of 106 cities in the country. As per the daily bulletin issued by Central Pollution Control Board on Saturday, the top three most polluted cities in the country were Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh with the AQI level measured at 339, followed by Varanasi (321) and Patna (312). These were the only three cities which witnessed ‘very poor’ air quality, which can lead to respiratory illness on prolonged exposure.