The city’s weather for the next few days will be cold with the minimum temperature hovering around 10 degrees Celsius and no rain, an official of the Regional Meteorological Centre at Borjhar here said on Friday.
The weather seems conducive for the New Year celebrations.
The city has been experiencing an usual cold atmosphere as it should be in December. Guwahati’s coldest day was recorded on December 28, 1961, when the temperature plummeted to 5.6 degrees Celsius, the official said. Several times during the last decade, the minimum temperatures hovered at around 7 degrees to 8 degrees Celsius, much colder than this year.
The weather gradually became colder this month with the maximum temperature falling from 27 degrees Celsius on December 5 to 19 degrees Celsius on December 24. The mercury dropped sharply over the last week with the minimum temperature falling from 15 degrees to 11 degrees Celsius.
The seven-day forecast by the Met office indicated that both the minimum and the maximum temperatures are likely to fall even further. While the maximum temperature is likely to drop from 24 degrees to 22 degrees Celsius, the minimum temperature will see a further drop of around two degrees, from 11 degrees to 9 degrees Celsius on January 1. The city will also experience foggy mornings and clear skies later in the day.
On Friday, Guwahati remained engulfed in fog till 9am. However, the airport area was free from any disturbance and there was no disruption of flights, a Met office source said.
The presence of fog at night and during morning hours is attributed to high percentage of humidity. On Friday, there was around 70 per cent humidity in the city. The cloudy day also gave an impression that it is colder than usual but the maximum and minimum temperatures were 24 degrees and 10 degrees Celsius respectively.
“There was no report of fog in the airport area. It was more local in nature and was concentrated around the city only. It lasted for sometime in the morning but will not remain for long on Saturday. The nature of fog here is different than that of the Indo-Gangetic plains,” the source added.
Chance of precipitation in the city during the next few days is only 1 to 5 per cent. But light rain is expected to occur in Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and other places in the Northeast.
Guwahati residents had a chance to flaunt their winter clothes on Christmas. People were seen clad in trendy jackets, woollens and long boots. Colourful scarves and caps were accessorised with the outfits, to ward off the chill in the foggy evening.
If all is well in the New Year, a parade of fashionable outfits will surely be noticed.