Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, Nov 18: Kashmir remained cut off from rest of the country as air traffic at Srinagar airport was disrupted today due to poor visibility even as Valley remained under the grip of cold due to subzero night temperatures.
No flight landed or took off from Srinagar airport today due to poor visibility caused by foggy conditions. The dry weather in Kashmir this autumn and subzero night temperatures for the past one week has led to foggy conditions in Kashmir affecting air traffic since yesterday afternoon.
An airport official said that all 17 flights were cancelled today as there was no improvement in the visibility at Srinagar airport. He said that this is second time since yesterday that the flights were cancelled. He said that yesterday all afternoon flights were cancelled due to poor visibility.
As there are bleak chances of improvement in the visibility at Srinagar Airport tomorrow, so no rescheduling of the flights was done for tomorrow. However, as there is forecast of isolated showers at many places in Srinagar tomorrow and day after, the visibility on Sunday may improve.
Earlier, hundreds of passengers were waiting at Srinagar airport since morning to board their flights but they had to return after flights were cancelled.
In the meantime, with minus 9.2 degree Celsius night temperature, Kargil was the coldest town in the State today. “With minimum temperature dropping to minus 9.2 degree Celsius, Kargil town was the coldest in Jammu and Kashmir today,” the Met official said. In Leh, the lowest night temperature was recorded at minus 8.4 degree Celsius.
The night temperature in Srinagar, was comparably, better than what was recorded yesterday. The minimum night temperature in Srinagar was recorded at minus 2.5 degree Celsius, better than Thursday’s which dropped to minus 2.7.
The minimum temperature was minus 4.2 and minus 0.4 in Pahalgam and Gulmarg, respectively today.
However, day temperature at most of the places in Kashmir was above normal. Srinagar recorded 15.3 degree Celsius while normal day temperature for this time off the year was 15 degree Celsius, Qazigund 16.5 degree Celsius, Pahalgam 14.8 degree Celsius, Kupwara 14.9 degree Celsius, Kokernag 15.6 degree Celsius and Leh 11. 9 degree Celsius.
In Jammu region, the MeT office said the minimum temperature was 9.5 in Jammu city, while in Katra it was recorded at 11.5 degree Celsius. Batote town recorded 8.5 degrees Celsius, Banihal 4.5 and Bhaderwah 4.0 as their lowest night temperature.
Jammu recorded a day temperature of 25.1 degree Celsius, a drop of one degree Celsius from normal; Banihal recorded 24.5 degree Celsius which is 7 degree Celsius above normal; Batote recorded 21.5 degree Celsius which is 4 degree Celsius above normal; Katra recorded 22.6 degree Celsius which is normal for this time of the year while Bhaderwah recorded 20.8 degree Celsius which is 2 degree Celsius above normal.
The MeT official said that the night temperatures are likely to fall further as the present cold wave conditions would continue in the State during the next 48 hours.
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