JOIN USDelhi’s 10 consecutive months of weather records hint climate trouble
Delhi has broken at least one weather record every month since August last year, witnessing everything from rain to sweltering heat and biting cold, hinting that broader climate change is precipitating a shift in weather patterns.
Though meteorologists connect the national capital’s recent extreme weather conditions to temporary atmospheric events, they also acknowledge that climate change is likely playing a larger role. According to IMD data, Delhi’s denizens have suffered drastic rises and falls in mercury levels over the last ten months.
August: Delhi logged 236.5 mm of rainfall, the highest for the month in seven years, with half the monthly rainfall clocked in just two days.
September: The capital saw its hottest month in nearly two decades with an average maximum temperature soaring to 36.2 degrees Celsius and smashing a 2015 record of 36.1 degrees Celsius.
October: The city’s fortunes flipped with mercury levels falling to a mean minimum temperature of just 17.2 degrees Celsius and overshadowed a 58-year-old record.
November: Nippy weather continued and broke an even older record as mean minimum temperature slipped to 10.2 degrees Celsius, its lowest since 1949.
December: Delhi’s brutal winter intensified and December brought with it eight “cold wave” days, the most the city has seen since 1965.
January: Seven “cold wave” days broke a 2008 record and the city also flew past the record for the highest rainfall for the month in 21 years.
February: Though it marked the end of the harsh winter, it was the city’s second-warmest February in 120 years, with mean maximum temperatures reaching 27.9 degrees Celsius and the all-time record of 29.7 degrees Celsius in 2006 within spitting distance.
March: Mercury levels raced to 40.1 degrees Celsius on March 29, the hottest day in 76 years.
April: April brought back the cold as the city logged a decade-low in lowest minimum temperature on April 4, sinking to 11.7 degrees Celsius.
May: This month the capital broke multiple historical records, with cyclone Tauktae handing Delhi its biggest single-day rainfall record for the month on May 19-20 with 119.3 mm of precipitation and helped the monthly rainfall reach its second-highest since 2008.
Scientists and climate experts have long warned that extreme weather events like heat-waves and violent storms will become more frequent as a result of man-made climate change.
Indian meteorologists say that weather patterns are becoming more extreme not only in Delhi but in several parts of the country and it has become more apparent in recent years.
“Many all-time records are being broken in many parts of India in the last two to three years," Mahesh Palawat, vice-president of Skymet weather services, told Hindustan Times.
“We are seeing that extreme weather events are increasing. Over the last three years, we have also been noticing that the intensity of cyclones that are hitting the coasts of India is also increasing. All this is also an impact of the climate crisis.”
(With inputs from PTI)