Warm winter but a cold yearend

The mercury stayed below 16 degrees Celsius on Wednesday in the capital, keeping the maximum temperature six degrees colder than what is considered normal for this time of the year. The Northwesterly winds from the Himalayas also arrived to add to the chill, reports Avishek G Dastidar.

Officially, this was one of the warmest Decembers ever, but on Wednesday it ended with one of the coldest New Year’s Eves Delhi has had in recent years.

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The mercury stayed below 16 degrees Celsius on Wednesday, keeping the maximum temperature six degrees colder than what is considered normal for this time of the year. The Northwesterly winds from the Himalayas also arrived to add to the chill.

“The cloud covers which’ve been preventing winter-like chill from settling throughout the month have now vanished for a while. So Delhi will greet the new year on a very cold note,” said S.C. Bhan, director at India Meteorological Department.

The low maximum temperature coupled with a minimum temperature of 8.2 degrees Celsius made it the coldest December 31 in four years. The all-time record for this day was in 2002 when the maximum was 11.2 degrees.

The Met department says this is one of the warmest Decembers in 107 years. There were only five days when the temperatures were below normal. “In terms of the monthly average of day temperatures, this was the fifth warmest December ever. And in terms of the average minimum temperatures, this was the tenth warmest in Delhi’s history,” Bhan said.

To make matters better for revellers, the chances of heavy fog were ruled out for the next two days.