Snowfall in Himachal Pradesh: Over 500 roads, including 4 national highways, closed

Shimla: After consecutive days of moderate to heavy snow in several parts of the Himachal Pradesh, 504 roads, including four national highways, in the state were closed for vehicular traffic, officials said.

Shimla, the state’s capital, saw a brief spell of snowfall on Saturday bringing cheer to residents and tourists. The city and its adjoining areas witnessed intermittent snowfall with overcast skies.

The weather office predicted heavy snow in isolated places of the state on Sunday.

The local MeT station has issued a yellow alert for thunderstorm and lightning in isolated places on Saturday and for thunderstorm, lightning and hail storm with heavy snow at isolated places on Sunday.

The state saw moderate to heavy snow in several parts on January 31 and February 1.

According to the state emergency operation centre, a maximum of 161 roads are blocked in Shimla, 153 in Lahaul and Spiti, 76 in Kullu and 62 in Chamba district and 674 transformers and 44 water supply schemes have been disrupted.

Road clearing operations are going on in full swing to clear snow from the roads at the earliest, PWD officials said.

Intense cold wave conditions persisted in most parts even as minimum temperatures rose by a few notches but stayed below normal. The weather remained dry and no snow or rain was reported from any part of the state in the past 24 hours.

Kukumseri with minus 8.1 degree Celsius was coldest at night while Narkanda, Kalpa, Dalhousie and Manali shivered at minus 5.6 degrees Celsius, minus 3.7 degrees Celsius, minus 3.1 degrees Celsius and minus 1.8 degrees Celsius respectively. Shimla recorded a minimum night temperature of 1.8 degrees Celsius.