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Mercury crosses 40°C in parts of Delhi, dusty winds from Rajasthan hit air quality
New Delhi: As the maximum temperature on Tuesday crossed the 40°Celsius-mark in parts of Delhi, strong gusts carrying dust from the western parts of India pushed
New Delhi: As the maximum temperature on Tuesday crossed the 40°Celsius-mark in parts of Delhi, strong gusts carrying dust from the western parts of India pushed the national Capital’s air quality deeper into the “moderate” category on Tuesday.
The overall air quality index (AQI) of Delhi stood at 130 — in the ‘moderate’ category — on Tuesday, according to Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) data, an increase from Monday’s 126.
Scientists at the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said the spike in pollution was due to strong winds from west and north Rajasthan bringing dust into the city.
A senior CPCB official said parts of Rajasthan had received rain last week, but that the temperature in the state had crossed 40°C over the last two or three days.
Since the heat has led to water in the soil evaporating, the soil itself has become loose and is being easily carried by the wind, which is present blowing in Delhi’s direction.
“That is why the spike is in PM10 (dust particles of diameters less than 10 micrometres) levels. PM2.5 (ultra-fine particles of diameters less than 2.5 micrometres) levels have not shown much variation,” the CPCB official said.
System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research (Safar), the Union ministry’s weather and air quality monitoring centre, predicted that this dust will deteriorate Delhi’s air quality further, into the lower range of ‘poor’ zone, by Wednesday.
“Though chances of any heavy dust storm are remote, long-range dust transport from the dry and arid western region is expected by April 15 to further deteriorate air quality towards the lower end of the poor category, with PM10 the lead pollutant. This impact is purely attributed to external natural dust, and has nothing to do with local emissions,” said a spokesperson from the Union ministry of environment, forest and climate change.
The PM10 levels shot up from 99.4ug/m3 at 1 am on Monday to 138.3ug/m3 at 6pm on Tuesday, while PM2.5 levels rose from 39.3ug/m3 to 54.4ug/m3 in the same period.
Meanwhile, the city’s mercury levels also shot up. According to the IMD, the maximum temperature recorded at the Safdarjung observatory, considered the official marking for the entire city, was 39.7 °C, four degrees higher than the season’s normal.
The minimum temperature was 23.2° C, two degrees above normal.
Meanwhile, the maximum temperatures at the Palam and Aya Nagar weather stations crossed the 40°C-mark on Monday. At Palam, the maximum temperature was recorded 41.2°C, and the minimum was 24.1°C. At Aya Nagar, the maximum settled at 40.4 degrees Celsius. The minimum temperature data at Aya Nagar station was unavailable.
IMD scientists said temperatures are likely to remain in the same range on Wednesday, after which there will be a marginal drop in the maximum temperature.
“From Thursday, there is a possibility of overcast skies, with chances of scanty rain in some parts. There is also a forecast of a western disturbance crossing Delhi on April 17. This, however, will not bring any rainfall to the Delhi-NCR regions,” said Kuldeep Srivastava, head of IMD’s regional weather forecasting centre.
