FOUR O’ CLOCK ON A FRIDAY EVENING
NEWDELHI: The skies turned dark on Friday afternoon as dense clouds covered the city, followed by heavy rain and strong winds — clearing pollutants and brining the mercury down by at least six notches but causing huge traffic jams in the evening peak hours.
Till 8.30 am on Friday, 20.4 mm rain was recorded over the past 24 hours, the highest 24-hour rainfall in the month of March since 2015 and the second highest in a decade.
Waterlogging in key stretches resulted in traffic snarls. According to traffic officials, jams were reported from major stretches, including Ring Road, Rajghat, Ashram Chowk, Barapullah, Vivek Vihar underpass, Yamuna Vihar underpass, Vikas Marg, Chirag Dilli flyover, ITO and Ranjeet Singh flyover , among others.
The Safdarjung Observatory, considered representative of Delhi’s weather, recorded 16.8 mm rainfall over nine hours between 8.30 am and 5.30 pm on Friday, which too is the highest since 2015. On March 2, 2015, 56.8 mm rainfall was recorded over 24 hours. Other weather stations, including Delhi Ridge, received 24.8 mm, Palam 22.3 mm, Lodhi Road 17.8 mm and Ayanagar 17.2 mm.
A senior scientist at the India Metrological Department (IMD) said the rainfall recorded was in the ‘moderate’ category (15 mm to 64 mm) and was mainly resulted by an intense western disturbance accompanied with a cyclonic circulation over West Rajasthan.
“This is the second WD that hit Delhi and its neighbouring regions in March. The activity was a result of an induced cyclonic circulation in West Rajasthan combined with the WD, which hit all of northwestern India. Gusty winds at a speed of 50 kmph blew across Delhi,” said Kuldeep Srivastava, head of IMD’S regional weather forecasting centre (RWFC).
The WD will pass over Delhi by Friday night and only traces of rain may occur on Saturday. Sunday is likely to see clear skies.
“Usually four to five WDS are expected in Delhi in March. Another WD is likely to hit the city from the night of March 10 while light rain is expected on
March 11-12. Gusty winds up to 20-25kmph will return from the night of March 9,” he added.
The rain and wind brought the mercury down by at least six notches. The maximum (day) temperature on Friday was 22.4 degrees C, six notches below the season’s average while minimum settled at 14 degrees C, a notch above normal.
Rainfall and strong surface winds improved the air quality, though remaining in the ‘satisfactory’ zone for the second consecutive day and may improve to the ‘good’ zone by Saturday.
The Central Pollution Control Board 4 pm bulletin said the air quality index (AQI) was 64. It was 79 on Thursday. Previously, air quality was recorded satisfactory on March 1 when the AQI was 90.
According to the System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR), the Central government’s air quality monitoring and forecasting wing, good winds and rain had kept the air quality in check over the past three days. “SAFAR model suggests an improvement in AQI to the lower end of satisfactory to ‘good’ category by tomorrow,” it said.