Wednesday, February 19, 2025
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Wednesday, February 19, 2025
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January Heat Crosses 26°C, Sparking Concerns Over Winter’s End

This January’s temperatures exceeding 26 degrees Celsius are setting the tone for 2025 after 2024 was the warmest year on record. In Northwest and Central India, the typical winter chill is absent, and the “disappearing spring” effect is exacerbated by brilliant sunshine and dry westerly breezes.

According to the weather office, over the past 24 hours, minimum or night temperatures were “markedly above normal” (5 degrees Celsius or more) at isolated places in East Madhya Pradesh and East Rajasthan; “appreciably above normal” (3 to 5 degrees Celsius) at most places over Indo-Gangetic plains, Central and West India, Assam and Meghalaya, and at isolated places in Haryana, Chandigarh and Delhi, Kerala and Mahe, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Karaikal; and “above normal” (1 to 3 degrees Celsius) at a few places in Gangetic West Bengal and isolated places in Jammu-Kashmir-Ladakh-Gilgit-Baltistan-Muzaffarabad, Punjab, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Rayalaseema.

In Amritsar, Punjab, the lowest recorded minimum temperature in the plains was 6.1 degrees Celsius. Meteorologists predict that temperatures will drop over the weekend, although not significantly. A cyclonic circulation over southwest Madhya Pradesh and the surrounding area may deliver some rain or snow to the Western Himalayan Region in addition to the current western disturbance.

A drop in temperature is anticipated starting on the morning of January 24 when the western disturbance departs. Although snow and rain can lower the temperature, does that also mean that extreme cold will return? The response is improbable.

The meteorological office predicts a “gradual fall in minimum temperatures over the Northwest of 2 to 4 degrees Celsius over the next three days and no significant change thereafter.” The truth is that as a result of climate change, the seasons are changing along with the weather. In recent years, there has been a noticeable shift from winter to summer, with the winter season being shorter and the spring season virtually nonexistent.

Mahesh Palawat of Skymet Weather says that this year, dry westerly winds in January brought down the moisture and cleaned the air, which in turn reduced the probability of severe fog, presenting clear skies and bright Sun. “Hill states Himachal and Uttarakhand received less snow and the already delayed winter was over before it even started,” he added. Earlier, the icy winds from hills would keep the plains shivering till most of January and also February.

Earlier, the winter season would gradually shift into a pleasant spring season followed by the scorching summers and June-September monsoon season. However, data shows that not only India is seeing fewer winter days, the pleasantness of the spring in February-March is also missing.

In the past couple of years, December has been quite un-winterlike, and the delayed cooling in January is being followed by strong warming in February, almost all across the northern, western and central parts, including Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Ladakh, and Jammu and Kashmir. Rather, the quick warming has made February feel like March.

Last year was the warmest year on record in India since 1901, with the country’s annual mean land surface air temperature in 2024 maintaining 0.65 degrees Celsius above the long-term average. “The annual mean temperature in 2024 was 25.75 degrees Celsius, 0.65 degree above the long-period average, making it the highest recorded since 1901. The average maximum temperature stood at 31.25 degrees Celsius, 0.20 degree above normal, the fourth-highest since 1901,” according to IMD.

Additionally, the weather office predicted that January minimum temperatures would be “higher than usual in January, with exceptions in parts of eastern, northwest, and west-central regions” throughout the majority of India. With the exception of a few locations in central, eastern, and northwest India as well as the center southern peninsula, most of the country is also predicted to have maximum or day temperatures that are higher than usual. “Long-term data shows most parts of the country are witnessing a rising trend in minimum temperatures, particularly in the post-monsoon and winter seasons,” says IMD Director General Mrutyunjay Mohapatra.

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