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There is no respite from the chilling cold and dense fog conditions over the plains of North-West India even as the New Year has dawned. Oodles of moisture left behind by a western disturbance are getting condensed into dense fog by the icy winds blowing in from the Himalayas. These winds have lowered day and night temperatures as well.
India Meteorological Department (IMD) said the light winds have only helped sustain these conditions in the plains. Dense to very dense fog may descend on some/many parts of Uttarakhand, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh during the morning/night hours for the next 2-3 days. It will spread to isolated pockets over Bihar over the next four days.
Fog for East, North-East
Dense fog is also forecast over isolated pockets of Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, hills of West Bengal, Assam and Tripura during the next two days. The western disturbance was stationed over Uttar Pradesh on Monday and will continue to move to Bihar and the rest of East and North-East India, bringing clouds or fog, as the case may be, depending on the moisture they carry.
Satellite shows dry and warm air representing moisture in various extent (yellow to golden yellow) over parts of East and Central India on Monday afternoon even as North-West India is clearing up, lowering night temperatures
Cold day conditions were forecast in isolated pockets over Uttar Pradesh and West Madhya Pradesh on Monday, where clouds do not allow sunlight to beam straight on to the ground. On the other hand, night temperatures may fall by 2-4 degrees Celsius over North-West and adjoining Central India from Tuesday as clouds gradually clear out and allow the icy winds to sink to the ground.
This is exactly what a seasonal anticyclone with higher pressure and cold, dry and sinking air (unlike a low-pressure system with warm, moisture-laden and rising air) does during the northern hemisphere winter. Cold wave to severe cold wave conditions will prevail over parts of North Rajasthan on Monday and Tuesday and not change much thereafter. Cold wave conditions are also forecast for parts of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh and Delhi over the next 4-5 days.
On Sunday, dense to very dense fog hung over many parts of Punjab, some parts of Bihar, and isolated parts of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Tripura. Dense fog was reported from Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh and moderate fog from parts of Uttarakhand and the hills of West Bengal, while it was shallow over Assam, Jharkhand, West Rajasthan and even Coastal Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
Visibility down to zero
Visibility was reduced to nil at Gorakhpur, Agra and Gwalior; and slightly better at 25 metres in Bhagalpur, Patna, Amritsar, Chandigarh, Patiala, Ambala and Hissar; 50 metres in Agartala, Purnea, Bahraich, Sagar, Jabalpur, Bhopal and Ambikapur; 100 metres in Bhatinda; 200 metres in Malda, Gaya and Dehradun; and 500 metres in Dibrugarh, North Lakhimpur, Jamshedpur, Varanasi, Lucknow, Jhansi, Palam, Bapatla and Arakkonam.
Fog is not unusual over the South Peninsula during this time of year, often manifesting as smoke from various sources and fog in the form of water droplets suspended in the air and transported by cool winds around the anticyclone over North-West and Central India. Temperatures at some hill stations in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka are known to plumb to zero degree Celsius at times.
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