PremiumListen to this article |
Following a bout of hot and humid weather for over a week, rainfall finally arrived in Delhi with the onset of monsoon season, bringing with it some much-needed respite. Rain lashed parts of Delhi beginning Monday afternoon, bring temporary relief from the muggy weather conditions, along with traffic snarls and waterlogging in several areas.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast generally cloudy sky for Tuesday with the possibility of light rain or thundershowers and the maximum and minimum temperatures are likely to settle around 36 and 27 degrees Celsius, respectively. Delhi and the NCR region woke up to heavy rains and thunderstorm on Tuesday due to which the Delhi Police took to Twitter to share a traffic alert for commuters to plan their travel accordingly. “The city is expected to witness traffic snarls," the Delhi Police advised the commuters to plan their journey accordingly.
Meanwhile, on Monday, the maximum temperature was recorded at 36.9 degrees Celsius, a notch below the season's average, while the minimum settled at 27.1 degrees Celsius, normal for this time of the year, the weather office said. The Palam observatory received traces of rainfall while Pitampura received 77.5 mm of rainfall. The Delhi University received 11.4 mm rainfall whereas Najafgarh received 4 mm of rainfall.
The Delhi Traffic Police took to twitter to inform and alert commuters about the congestion and plan their journeys accordingly. The traffic police said both the carriageways on GTK road near GTK depot were waterlogged along with Azadpur underpass and the two carriageways of Ring Road.
"Traffic is affected on New Rohtak Road in both carriageways due to waterlogging at Anand Parbat T-Point. Kindly avoid the stretch," it said in a tweet. In another tweet, it informed that traffic was heavy at Najafgarh Firni road due to waterlogging and urged commuters hem to avoid the stretch.
While woke up to a humid Monday morning and the relative humidity at 8.30 am was 75 per cent, the sky became overcast in the afternoon and rains lashed parts of the city. The monsoon embraced Delhi in an impressive manner on June 30 but rains had repeatedly given the capital a miss since then.
The Safdarjung Observatory had recorded just 2.6 mm of rainfall in the last 10 days. It had gauged 144.3 mm of rainfall against a normal of 126.7 mm since June 1, when the monsoon season starts. While just 2 mm of rainfall occurred in the next three days (July 1-July 3), the Met office on July 4 issued a yellow alert for July 5 and an orange alert for July 6, which was later shifted to July 7.
Mahesh Palawat, vice president (meteorology and climate change), of Skymet Weather had on Sunday said that Delhi would not get any rain on Monday and Tuesday. The minimum temperature on Monday morning was recorded at 27.1 degrees Celsius, normal for this time of the year. Delhi's air quality was recorded in the "satisfactory" category as the air quality index (AQI) read 95 at 4 pm.
(With inputs from PTI)