Delhi colder than Mussouri, Shimla; even London is hotter

New Delhi: Delhi turned out as chiller than British capital, London, on Monday when the temperature plunged to the season’s low of 4.2 degrees Celsius.

Popular hill stations such as Mussouri and Shimla too found their places behind the national capital recording their lowest between 9 to 16 degrees C and 6.2 degrees C, respectively.

London, however, happened to be at the lowest of 10 degrees C on Monday.

The first working day of the week started with a dense foggy morning in Delhi that lasted up to late afternoon, making conditions too-harsh-to-handle for children and elder citizens in the capital. Considering the cold spell on Monday, the Met department declared the day as ‘cold day,’ meaning that the day’s highest temperature was more than 5 degrees below normal.

Even the reports of the weather office failed to justify when it had predicted that the fog conditions in Delhi would be better from Monday. “Fog is likely to continue at least till December 28-29," informed R K Jenamani, director in-charge, IGI Met.

Falling prey to the sudden upsurge of fog and cold, 242 flights were affected at IGI Airport, where visibility dropped to zero forcing many passengers to return to home. With around 40 trains being rescheduled, a total of 100 trains were affected, some nearly 24 hours late.

Palam Airport in Delhi recorded the maximum of 16.4 degrees and minimum of 5.9 degrees Celsius. The weather report for various NCR regions too hints to quite harsh conditions with Faridabad 12.5 and Indirapuram being 12.4. It was Najafgarh in Delhi where the lowest minimum of 2.4 degrees was recorded closely followed by Jafrabad at 2.9 and Narela with 3.2 degrees C.

Adding further, Jenamani said that the cold spell will continue till December 29 with a slight variation in intensity and duration. However, chances of a slight break from chilly wind can be expected on December 25 and the following morning.