Winter rains begin in Noida and other parts of Delhi NCR with lightning and thunderstorm activities. In fact, last 24 hours has seen intense lightening, thunderclouds alongwith strong gusty winds and scattered rains across Noida- Greater Noida and in neighbouring areas of Ghaziabad, Faridabad, Gurugram and the capital Delhi. There were some instances of hailstorm as well.

Thunderclouds gathered energy during late night hours and there was another spell by the wee hours of early Tuesday morning. The rainy weather conditions with strong gusty winds developed since January 21 with dense patch of cloud seen moving across the city. Some areas in Noida and Greater Noida witnessed scattered rains on Monday.

It was eerie darkness till around 9-ish in the morning today. People shared images on social media asking to guess the time in the city with captions like -‘Is it Day or Night’?? People wondered on twitter, ‘Can’t make out if it’s morning or evening, monsoon or winter’, ‘…it’s 8am and look like…8pm’ and this one was creative ‘…it seems like even Sun is on Sick leave’.

In the past one week, winter chill had retreated in most parts of the region with bright and sunny days that lead to an increase in temperatures. The day temperatures, at most places, have been hovering between 23-25 degrees Celsius, an unusual high for the month of January.

This was the first widespread spell of winter rains. The rains have been primarily patchy dipping the mercury levels to 18˚C. However, the minimum temperatures remained at 11 degrees.

Winter Rains in Noida and NCR

The month of January hardly observes any heavy spells of rains for Noida city and adjoining areas of Delhi, Gurugram, Ghaziabad, Faridabad. But this was a second spell of rain this winter. Earlier, rains had occurred over Delhi NCR on January 6, but the intensity was not too high as compared to the ongoing rains. This time the rains could be tagged as ‘heavy’ in terms of intensity that is usually observed during winters.

Cause of the Winter Rains

This weather system, as per Skymet, is attributed to active Western Disturbance over the Northern Hills and its induced cyclonic circulation over the Northwestern Plains. This has led to marginal drop in day temperatures in the city and adjoining areas of Delhi-NCR.

Winter Rains Intensity in Noida and NCR

Noida has been the worst hit by the rains, recording 32.5 mm received in past 24 hours, Bijnore got 30.8 mm, while Ghaziabad received 25.2 mm rains in the same time.

In Lucknow, the minimum temperature was recorded at 8.2 degrees Celsius while the maximum was expected to be around 18. In the last 24 hours from 8:30 am on Monday, Safdarjung observatory has recorded 14.8 mm of rainfall while observatory at Palam has recorded 23 mm of rainfall during the same time frame.

Rains a Boon for Improving Air Quality

One thing for sure has turned out good is that rains improved the air quality in the city.

In terms of pollution, Noida at 352 and Greater Noida at 357 along with Faridabad at 319, Ghaziabad at 375 improved to “very poor” as reported in daily pollution analysis by System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research. It has forecast an improvement in Delhi’s air quality from “very poor” to “poor” by Wednesday.

The overall Air Quality Index (AQI) of Delhi at 4 p.m on Monday stood at 346 (very poor), against Sunday’s “severe” air quality at 404.Gurugram, on the other hand, recorded “poor” quality of air.

Noida and Delhi-NCR witnessed waterlogging and traffic snarls during the rush hours. Meanwhile, due to the occurrence of rains, fog did not make appearance for a while.

Image Credits: Fauzia Naaz Twitter
Inputs from Skymet Weather

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