Air quality, visibility drop as winds raising dust sweep Delhi

Strong winds swept across Delhi on Tuesday morning, raising dust and affecting air quality as well as reducing visibility to 1,000 metres, the India Meteorological Department said.

Meteorologists have attributed the dusty conditions to a combination of intense heat in northwest India over the past five days, parched soil due to the absence of rainfall and strong winds that have persisted since midnight.

The wind speed was 30-35 kmph in the early hours. It will come down during the day, allowing the dust to settle down, Kuldeep Srivastava, the head of the IMD's regional forecasting centre said.

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"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," said V K Soni, the head of the IMD's Environment Monitoring and Research Centre.

Over the past four days, Delhi witnessed maximum temperatures soaring above the 40-degree Celsius mark, intensifying the hot weather conditions.

A partly cloudy sky and very light rain towards the evening may provide marginal relief, the IMD said.

The maximum temperature is predicted to rise to 44 degrees Celsius by Sunday.