Owais Gul
Srinagar, Nov 26: Amid dry weather conditions, the night temperature has plummeted further across the valley with mercury settling to the lowest of the season at Srinagar.
As per the details available, Srinagar, the summer capital of J&K, recorded the season’s coldest night at minus 3.9 degrees Celsius.
Pahalgam, a famous tourist destination, also recorded the season’s coldest night at 4.6 degrees Celsius.
The mercury also dropped by some degrees at other stations, with Qazigund, a gateway of Kashmir, recording a low of minus 3.4 degrees Celsius. Kokernag in south Kashmir recorded a minimum temperature of minus 1.4 degrees Celsius. Kupwara in north Kashmir recorded a low of 4.0 degrees Celsius.
While the mercury has plummeted across the valley, Director Meteorological Department (MeT), Dr Mukhtar Ahmad, has predicted further fall in both maximum and minimum temperatures by 1-2 degrees Celsius during the next seven days.
According to him, shallow to moderate fog would likely continue at many places of the Kashmir division and isolated places of the Jammu division.
Director MeT further said that generally dry weather is expected till December 1. “On December 2, the weather is expected to remain generally cloudy towards afternoon,” he said. Earlier, the MeT Director had predicted the possibility of a brief spell of very light snow over isolated higher reaches towards the afternoon.
The weatherman further added that generally dry weather is expected on December 3 & December 4, while cloudy weather is expected towards the afternoon on December 05.
However, he added that the weather would remain generally dry from December 06 to December 10.
Pertinently, the chill is expected to intensify further, especially after mid-December when the 40-day harshest winter period, known as Chilla-i-Kalan, will commence. Chilla-i-Kalan will begin on December 21, which is followed by the 20-day Chilla-i-Khurd and later the 10-day Chilla-i-Bacha.
