Chandigarh, April 17
The entire north-west region today stayed enveloped in a dust haze following dust-raising winds from Rajasthan during the past 24 hours.
As the visibility was sharply reduced to 1.5 km, the to and fro Jet Airways and the Indian Airlines flights were delayed by 20 minutes and 135 minutes, respectively.
While the Jet Airways flight returned to New Delhi on almost schedule, the IA Chandigarh-Delhi-Mumbai return flight was delayed by 55 minutes.
The Weather Bureau here said the dust storms across Bikaner and Sriganganagar around 11.30 am further intensified the dust haze in the region during the day. The bureau has forecast rain or thundershowers at isolated places in the hilly states and isolated dust or thunderstorms in plains of the region over the next 48 hours.
The bureau has also warned of hailstorms and thunder squalls, exceeding 45 km per hour velocity at isolated places in Punjab, Haryana and the neighbourhood during this period.
The north-west region, after experiencing the hottest day yesterday, saw the mercury
plummeting today by two to four degrees under the ‘’packaging conditions’’ caused by haze and scattered clouding.
Meanwhile, the whole of Kulu valley was overcast by dust this afternoon while strong winds lashed the lower region of the valley in the wee hours till 7 am and then after 4 pm. The visibility declined to 500 metres at the Bhuntar airport forcing cancellation of all flights to and from Kulu.
