National Weather Forecast: January 15, Wednesday

Dense to very dense fog is forecast to blanket parts of Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and North-East Rajasthan until tomorrow (Thursday) as a fresh western disturbance with its steam engine up front chugs in.

The moisture-spewing disturbance will trigger scattered to widespread rain or snow over the hills of North India, but forecasts do not say if it will send down an offspring circulation across the border into India just yet. 

Isolated to scattered showers forecast

The eastward moving disturbance will extend the fog cover to Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura into Friday, an India Meteorological Department (IMD) outlook said.

Scattered rain/snow is forecast over Jammu & Kashmir and widespread rain/snow over Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, with isolated heavy falls over Uttarakhand tomorrow. Isolated to scattered rain/ thunderstorms are likely over Punjab from today (Wednesday) to Saturday; over Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan today and tomorrow; and scattered to fairly widespread rain/ thunderstorms over Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh from tomorrow to Saturday.

Isolated thunderstorms accompanied with hail/ lightning are also likely over Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh today and tomorrow. 

Successor disturbance seen

A successor disturbance may affect the region from January 18 to 20 (Saturday to Monday), and trigger scattered to fairly widespread precipitation over the hills of North-West India and the adjoining plains.

The IMD has maintained the outlook for peak activity from the disturbance to materialise on Sunday. Isolated to scattered rain is forecast over the hills of North-West India and adjoining plains, before covering the North-Eastern States, mainly Arunachal Pradesh, in line with the movement of the larger western disturbance.

No further western disturbances are forecast to visit North-West India until at least January 25, which could also mean that the colder westerlies and north-westerlies might blow into the region, taking the mercury level lower by Republic Day on January 26.

International weather models support the forecast for mostly clear conditions to plentiful sunlight for the national Capital on Republic Day.

Temperatures to look up

The IMD expects temperatures to rise gradually by 2-3 degree Celsius over North and East India during the next two to three days, with no significant change in maximum and minimum temperatures over the rest of the country.

Yesterday (Tuesday), Karwar (Coastal Karnataka) recorded the highest maximum temperature of 35.9 degree Celsius, while Narnaul and Hissar (Haryana, Chandigarh and Delhi) recorded the lowest minimum temperature of 3.5 degree Celsius over the plains.

This (Wednesday) morning, dense to very dense fog was observed in isolated pockets over Punjab, West Rajasthan, Bihar and Odisha, while it was dense over Himachal Pradesh, East Uttar Pradesh, West Rajasthan, Odisha and Tripura, and moderate over West Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura.

The fog had reduced visibility to below 25 metres during the morning hours in Amritsar, Ganganagar, Patna and Bhubaneshwar; below 50 metres in Sundernagar, Jaisalmer, Sultanpur, Bhagalpur, Puri and Agartala; and below 200 metres in Bareilly, Varanasi, Gaya, Chandbali, Bhopal, Kailashahar and Silchar.   

Air quality moderate in Chennai

In the South, the air quality in Chennai was moderate (which represents only limited improvement) on Pongal day on Wednesday, after the bonfires associated with the Bhogi festival saw it take a dive only the previous day. In Andhra Pradesh, which also observes Bhogi, the air quality was poor in Rajamahendravaram and Visakhapatnam, while being moderate in Amaravati and satisfactory in Tirupati. This contrasted with the mostly poor air quality levels in the national capital of Delhi on Wednesday.

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