New Delhi, 12 Feb (UNI): Swift southwesterly winds over the national capital dispersed toxic pollutants, improving the air quality on Thursday morning.
At 9 am on Thursday, Delhi’s air quality index stood at 194 in the ‘moderate’ category, improving sharply from Wednesday’s readings of 305, which logged in the ‘poor’ category, according to data from the Sameer app.
As per CPCB classification, an AQI between 0 and 50 is ‘good’, 51 to 100 ‘satisfactory’, 101 to 200 ‘moderate’, 201 to 300 ‘poor’, 301 to 400 ‘very poor’, and 401 to 500 ‘severe’.
Experts attributed the improvement to strong surface winds dispersing pollutants that had accumulated near the ground, bringing slight relief from hazardous air.
“Southwesterly surface winds speed reaching 17 kmph prevailed during the past 24 hours over Delhi,” said officials from the India Meteorological Department.
Strong sustained surface wind currents are likely over the national capital on Thursday, gusting up to 20 kmph during the daytime.
Despite the brisk breeze, the city continued to warm under clear skies, with bright sunshine pushing the maximum temperature to 27.6 degrees Celsius. At Safdarjung, Delhi’s base weather station, the mercury touched 27.5 degrees Celsius, according to the IMD’s morning bulletin. The minimum settled at 11.6 degrees Celsius, 1.4 degrees above normal for this time of year.
