Delhiites on Tuesday woke up to strong winds across the city, raising dust and affecting the air quality. The visibility in the national capital was reduced to 1,000 metres, reported the India Meteorological Department. The reason for this dusty condition as per the meteorologists was a combination of intense heat in northwest India over the past five days, dried-up soil due to the absence of rainfall, and strong winds that persisted since midnight, reported news agency PTI.
In the early hours, the wind speed was recorded at 30-35 Kmph. IMD's Head of Regional Forecasting Kuldeep Srivastava said that the speed of the wind will only come down during the day which will allow the dust to settle down.
The head of the IMD's Environment Monitoring and Research Centre VK Soni said, "Dust concentration has gone up multiple times. The PM10 concentration rose from 140 micrograms per cubic metre at 4 am to 775 micrograms per cubic metre at 8 am. It is mainly because of strong gusty winds prevailing over the area. Dust will settle down soon," reported PTI. IMD said that a partly cloudy sky and very light rain towards the evening may provide some relief.
As per the available data, PM10 levels are really high at most of the stations while India Gate, Patparganj, and Pusa recorded the worst AQI.
Experts claimed that the cyclonic circulation over Rajasthan is to blame for the dust in Delhi. Dust storms and light rain were caused by the cyclonic circulation over North Rajasthan. For the following three to four days, this activity's impact will be seen in phases over Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana, and parts of Punjab, reported India Today.
Over the period of the past four days, Delhi witnessed the maximum temperatures going above the 40-degree Celsius mark which led to the hot weather conditions intensifying even more and it is going to witness the temperature rise up to 44 Deg Celsius by the upcoming Sunday.