Delhi under yellow alert as multiple spells of rain likely through the week, says IMD

The weather office has also forecast multiple spells of very light to light rain at a few places on Friday and Saturday.

Parts of Delhi woke up to light showers on Wednesday, with the India Meteorological Department (IMD) forecasting more rain through the day and on Thursday. The weather office has issued a ‘yellow’ alert for both days, predicting light to moderate rainfall and multiple spells of showers across the national capital.

Kanwariyas shield themselves from heavy rainfall at India Gate in New Delhi. (PTI)

Several parts of the city received light rain late Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning. Between 11.30pm on Tuesday and 8.30am on Wednesday, Mayur Vihar recorded 1mm of rainfall, followed by Chhatarpur and Jafarpur with 0.5mm each. Safdarjung, the city’s base weather station, recorded 0.2mm during the same period.

At around 10.30am, the IMD issued a yellow alert for light rain and light thunderstorms covering northeast, central, east, southeast and south Delhi, along with Shahdara, and most parts of north, northwest and New Delhi. Parts of west Delhi were also included in the alert.

“Light to moderate intermittent rainfall is very likely to occur at few places of Delhi (Karawal Nagar, Dilshad Garden, Buddha Jayanti Park, Delhi Cantt, India Gate, Safdarjung, Lodi Road, Nehru Stadium, RK Puram, Defence Colony, Lajpat Nagar, Hauz Khas, Malviya Nagar, Kalkaji, Tughlakabad),” the IMD said at 10.26am.

Later, the met department extended the alert to parts of north east, north, noth west, west, south west, and New Delhi as well. “Thunderstorm/lightning with moderate rain very likely over parts of South East Delhi, East Delhi, Shahdara, Central Delhi, North East Delhi, South Delhi, New Delhi, West Delhi, North West Delhi,” it stated.

The IMD has forecast one or two spells of very light to light rain at most places on Wednesday and Thursday, with moderate rainfall at a few locations from the forenoon to the afternoon. Another spell of very light to light rain is expected at many places towards the evening or night under generally cloudy skies.

The weather office has forecast multiple spells of very light to light rain at a few places on Friday and Saturday, with similar conditions likely from Sunday to Monday. The IMD classifies rainfall up to 15.5mm as ‘light’, 15.6mm to 64.4mm as ‘moderate’, 64.5mm to 115.5mm as ‘heavy’, and 115.6mm to 204.4mm as ‘very heavy’.

The rainfall is expected to keep temperatures below normal. The maximum temperature is likely to remain between 32 degrees Celsius and 34 degrees Celsius on Wednesday, dip to 31 degrees Celsius to 33 degrees Celsius on Thursday, and stay below 35 degrees Celsius over the next five days. The minimum temperature on Wednesday was recorded at 26.6 degrees Celsius.

Experts said rainfall was also likely across other parts of the National Capital Region (NCR).

“Overhead development kind of a day and it has been raining in parts of Noida, Faridabad, and southeast Delhi in the last 1-2 hours. Expect the coverage to go up in next 2-4 hours with likelihood of moderate to heavy showers in parts of north, central, west Delhi, Gurgaon, and Ghaziabad as well. Geographical coverage during such spells is expected to be 30-50% with nearly 20-55mm rainfall. Conditions remain favourable for (weather) activities till 5pm and reduction thereafter,” meteorologist Navdeep Dahiya posted on X at 10.32am on Wednesday.