Pune feels the heat, 20 degrees difference in max-minimum temperature

PUNE: The city felt warmer than usual on Wednesday, the last day of winter, after the mercury shot up to 35.7 degrees celsius in Shivajinagar and 36.2 degrees celsius in Lohegaon. The maximum temperatures are over 2 degrees higher than normal but are expected to fall in the next 2 days.
The difference between day and night temperatures was over 20 degrees in the city; with the minimum recorded at 14.9 degrees C in Shivajinagar and 17.9 degrees in Lohegaon.

20 deg difference in max-minimum temperature

This difference—with cooler mornings and hotter afternoons—has caused an increase in health issues, doctors said. The variation in temperature is known to cause an increase in health issues, especially when the body cannot adapt to the sudden temperature shifts.

An IMD official told TOI that the increase in temperature in the interiors of Maharashtra like Pune and other stations in central Maharashtra is the seasonal transition from winter to summer.

“While heat wave conditions are being experienced in isolated places in coastal Konkan, that cannot be connected to what is happening in the interiors. Interiors are being affected by the natural transition to summer,” the official said.

Meteorologist and All India Internet Weather Radio Station founder J R Kulkarni said clear skies cause heating from increased solar radiation during the day and cooling during the night as longwave radiation from the earth escapes to space. “If vegetation cover is more in a region, this difference tends to be small,” he said.