Flights cancelled, national highway closed: Snowfall disrupts normal life in Kashmir

Normal life was disrupted in Kashmir on Tuesday due to snowfall with the Valley remaining cut off from the rest of the world as Srinagar-Jammu national highway remained blocked and flights cancelled.

The 264-km Srinagar-Jammu national highway, the only road link connecting Kashmir with other parts of the country, was closed for the traffic due to snowfall and landslides at several places, an official spokesman said. More than 40 flights could not operate from Srinagar Airport due to intermittent snowfall. The official said the snow clearance machines were deployed by the Mechanical Engineering Department for clearance at the airport since morning. Meanwhile, Beacon authorities also deployed machines for clearance of apron and runway.

The local MeT department has issued an orange alert in Kashmir saying that prevalent rains and snowfall are expected to intensify in coming days. The orange alert, though a less severe warning than 'red', is meant to alert the authorities to be prepared for severe weather.

The alert comes a day after the weatherman issued an advisory for rains and snowfall in J&K till January 9 stating that the weather could cause disruption of surface traffic and trigger snow avalanches in vulnerable higher reaches.

In view of the impending bad weather, the MeT office has urged people not to venture out on avalanche- and landslide-prone areas, unless extremely necessary.

While people expressed excitement over the first snowfall in plains on social networking sites, children and youth were seen playing ‘Sheen Jung’ in the city and elsewhere. Tourists, who have arrived in huge numbers in Kashmir in recent days, were seen capturing the rare moment of snowfall in their cameras and mobile phones as 'snow men' sprang up in many parts of the Valley.

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