Clear sky with very-poor air quality in Delhi

It was a clear sky on Tuesday morning with minimum temperature recorded at 8.6 degrees Celsius, a notch below the season's average.

The national capital saw "very-poor" air-quality at 14 out of 15 active monitored areas, with major pollutant PM2.5 or particle with diameter less than 2.5 micrometres, ranging 205 units -- eight times higher than the international safe limit.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), the maximum temperature is likely to hover around 27 degrees Celsius.

The humidity recorded on Tuesday morning at 8.30 a.m. was 85 per cent, while on Monday it was 65 per cent.

"The wind direction is south-westerly, which is moist," an IMD official told IANS.

The IMD has forecast a slight rise in the minimum temperature with mist and shallow fog towards the Wednesday morning, thereby slight hike in the humidity as well.

"The minimum temperature on Wednesday is likely to hover around 10 degrees Celsius," the official said.

According to weather analysts, the moisture increases the air's capacity to hold the pollutant for a longer time causing pollution.

Meanwhile, System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting And Research (SAFAR) has predicted air-quality across Delhi-NCR to worsen further over the next three days.

At 9 a.m., Anand Vihar in east Delhi, Punjabi Bagh in west Delhi, R.K Puram in south-west Delhi and Delhi Technical University (DTU) in north Delhi were the most polluted regions in the national capital with air-quality recorded "beyond-severe or severe plus".

The minimum temperature recorded on Monday was 9 degrees Celsius, a notch below the season's average, while the maximum temperature was 26.2 degrees Celsius, a notch above the season's average.

--IANS

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