Delhi to keep chilling: Met dept

Delhi appears to be having a field day with winter, with the chill showing no signs of letting up.

Delhi appears to be having a field day with winter, with the chill showing no signs of letting up. For the second consecutive day, the mercury dropped to 6.4 degrees Celsius, the season’s lowest so far, on Wednesday.

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The maximum temperature — an indicator of the amount of chill throughout the day — was 21.1 degrees Celsius, two degrees lower than normal.

On top of that, the nippy northwesterly winds kept lashing at the Capital, further lowering the “felt-temperature” for Delhiites.

Met officials said snowfall in upper Himachal Pradesh and Kashmir has caused this spurt in the chill. “The mercury might fall again for some days,” said the duty officer at the Safdarjung Met office.

The weatherman has predicted mist in the morning and mainly clear sky later in the day tomorrow with maximum and minimum likely to hover around 21 and six degree Celsius, respectively.

There could be but a slight rise in the mercury in the coming days thanks to an approaching Western Distur-bance (WD)-a rainbearing system over the hills; its approach increases the temperatures by a few notches.

“We see a feeble WD system approaching the hills. There could be some increase in the temperatures but not much,” he said.

But that is not likely to mar the spirits of the winter winter lovers. “The holiday season is incomplete without this chill. We hope it becomes extremely cold by Christmas and really freezing by the time we greet the New Year,” said Raphael John, a government employee who lives in Paschim Vihar.

With over a week left in December, this is turning out to be colder than the corresponding period last year. In 2008, the lowest minimum of the month was 6.4 degree Celsius recorded on December 26 while in 2007, it was 3.9 degrees on December 29. The record for 2006 was 7.3 degree Celsius on November 29.

The all-time record for minimum temperature for the month was recorded on December 26 of 1945 when the mercury dipped to 1.1 degree Celsius.