Ludhiana shivers on coldest January 4 in 50 years

Ludhiana experiences coldest January 4th since 1970 with maximum temperature of 9.4°C, 8 degrees below average. No relief in sight, dense fog and cold wave predicted for next three days.

The city continues to reel under a bone-chilling spell, witnessing yet another historic low for maximum temperature on Thursday. It was the coldest January 4 day since 1970, when weather data collection began.

Commuters making their way through a thick blanket of fog in Ludhiana. (Gurpreet Singh/HT)

With a maximum temperature of 9.4° C and a minimum of 5.6° C, the day’s temperatures remained nearly 8 degrees below the normal average for the first week of January of 17.4° C.

The city has experienced almost zero sunshine hours in the past four days. Typically, the weekly mean of sunshine hours in the first week of January is 5.4 hours, but Ludhiana has been devoid of sunlight, intensifying the severity of the already harsh winter conditions.

The last time Ludhiana recorded such low maximum temperatures on January 4 was in the year 2000, with a reading of 10.4of 17.4° C .

Meteorological experts have forecast no respite for at least another three days, predicting dense to very dense fog accompanied by cold wave conditions in the coming days.

An orange alert has been issued until January 6 by PK Kingra, the head of the climate change and agriculture meteorological department at Punjab Agriculture University. Kingra stated, “Dense to very dense fog is likely over the next three to four days. Cold day to severe cold day conditions/cold wave conditions are also expected.”