Delhi’s air quality remains ‘very poor’; temperatures expected to rise

A western disturbance impacting the region was expected to bring thunderstorms on February 3-4, slow down the wind speed further, and lead to an increase in temperatures

Delhi’s air quality remained in the higher end of “very poor” category on Thursday due to slow winds of around five km per hour even as a shallow to moderate fog blanketed parts of the city and the minimum temperature rose to 9.2°C. Palam recorded visibility of 1,000 metres at 7am, which dipped to 700m at 8.30am. The visibility at Safdarjung dipped from 800 metres at 6.30am to 500 metres two hours later.

An Air Quality Index of 380 (very poor) was recorded at 9am. (HT PHOTO)

Safdarjung, which is representative of Delhi’s weather, recorded a minimum temperature of 9.2°C or 0.8° above the normal and 2.8° higher than that recorded on Thursday. Palam recorded a minimum temperature of 10.7°C, which was 1.8°degrees more than the day before.

A western disturbance impacting the region was expected to bring thunderstorms on February 3-4, slow down the wind speed further, and lead to an increase in temperatures. The mercury was expected to go up to 25-27°C.

An Air Quality Index (AQI) of 380 (very poor) was recorded at 9am compared to the 24-hour average of 365 (poor) at 4pm on Wednesday.

The deterioration of the air quality prompted the Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region to implement Stage 3 measures under the Graded Response Action Plan. The measures include restrictions on non-essential construction and demolition, a ban on older diesel vehicles, suspension of mining operations, closure of stone crushers, etc.