New Delhi, Nov 12 (UNI) Residents in the national capital on Wednesday woke up to another day of burning eyes and respiratory difficulties as the air quality index (AQI) continued to remain in the ‘severe’ category for the second day in a row.
While the data for Delhi’s 24-hour rolling average AQI was not accessible at the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) website, the updated readings at the Sameer app stood at 418 at 6 pm, which is categorised as ‘severe’.
As per CPCB’s classification, an AQI between 400 and 500 is considered ‘severe’, posing health risks even to healthy individuals and causing serious respiratory issues among those with pre-existing conditions.
To curb the further deterioration of the air, the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) on Tuesday invoked Stage 3 of the Graded Response Action Plan (Grap) across NCR with immediate effect.
This enforcement includes a ban on private construction and demolition work and restrictions on BS-3 petrol and BS-4 diesel four-wheelers in Delhi, Gurugram, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, and Gautam Budh Nagar.
Despite the kicking off of GRAP 3, 32 of Delhi’s 39 monitoring stations recorded ‘severe’ air, with Wazirpur (464) worst affected. Several other stations across Delhi crossed the 450 mark.
According to data from the Decision Support System (DSS) under the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) on Wednesday, a sharp spike was noted in stubble burning contribution to Delhi’s total PM2.5 concentration, climbing up to 22.474 percent, the highest in the season so far, exceeding the earlier highest of 15.458 percent.
Meanwhile, the Air Quality Early Warning System (EWS) forecasted that the AQI would revert to the ‘very poor’ category by Thursday and remain there until Saturday. The outlook for the subsequent six days also predicts ‘very poor’ air quality.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast shallow fog in the early hours, with winds of up to 20 km/hr on Thursday. Meanwhile, Delhi’s minimum temperature stood at 10.4°C, three degrees below normal, with similar lows expected on Thursday, while dropping further over the weekend to 8-10°C. The maximum temperature was recorded at 27.7°C. It is forecast to be between 25-27°C on Thursday.
