Heat Wave Unlikely Over Punjab-Haryana This Week

The month of April has slipped into the last 1/3rd segment, and the extreme heat is still missing from most parts of Punjab and Haryana. Places like Amritsar, Ludhiana and Patiala in Punjab still wait for the first 40°C of the season. Most parts of Haryana bordering Punjab and the Union Territory of Chandigarh are also in the queue for breaching the 40°C mark. Karnal, for the first time this season, reached 40°C yesterday.  Yes, locations contiguous to the arid region of Rajasthan, like Rohtak and Hisar, had crossed 40°C a few days back. Hisar has clocked a high of 43.5°C, and Rohtak, a shade lower, at 42.5°C.

An active western disturbance affecting the entire range of northern mountains and the foothills for the last 2-3 days is now making its way towards the Western Himalayas, away from Himachal and Uttarakhand. The weather conditions are already improving over the hilly states. A heavy spell of weather activity across Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh has suppressed any abrupt rise of temperatures over the plains. Fresh snowfall and hailstorms over the region have sent the relatively cold winds down the slopes of mountains, restricting overshooting of temperatures.

A heat wave is declared in the plains when the temperatures reach or exceed 40°C and the departure from the normal becomes 4.5°C or more. Most parts of Punjab and Haryana have failed to meet the first and foremost requirement of reaching 40°C. The locations with temperatures in excess of 40°C, like Hisar and Rohtak, have the progressive normal in the high 30s. For a heat wave, these places also need to observe persistent searing mercury, at least for two days in a row. Therefore, the heat wave has merely been restricted to very small pockets and also for brief durations over large portions of plains in the north.

A fresh western disturbance is approaching the mountains on 24th Apr. and will stay for 48 hours, till 25th April. As an aftereffect of this weather system, most parts of Punjab and Haryana may skip the first-ever heat wave of the season, for now.  A break in the weather systems is likely after 25th April and will stay good till the end of the month. High temperatures breaching the 40°C mark at a few places look quite feasible during the fag end of the month. The heat wave is likely to stay in abeyance till the last few days of the month.