Dense fog, curbs hit IGI ops; 150 flights delayed in Delhi

More than 150 flights were delayed at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport as dense fog, this time coupled with restrictions ahead of Republic Day, played havoc with air traffic for much of Tuesday.

Delhi’s minimum temperature, meanwhile, increased to 6.9°C, from 6.1°Ca day ago, as “cold day” conditions weakened in the city and the fog cleared out after 8.30am, though the India Meteorological Department (IMD) predicted moderate to dense fog would envelop Delhi early on Wednesday.

“Delhi and North India witnessed dense fog leading to delayed take offs from their origin airports. More than 150 flights at Delhi’s IGI airport were delayed on Tuesday. Seven were cancelled due to operational reasons,” said an Airports Authority of India (AAI) official aware of the matter.

IMD said there was dense fog in Palam and Safdarjung from 11.30pm on Monday, with the visibility dropping to 50m and 200m between 11.30pm and 8.30am on Tuesday. The agency classifies a fog as “shallow” when the visibility is between 500 and 1,000 metres, as “moderate” when it is between 200 and 500 metres, “dense” when it is between 50 and 200 metres and “very dense” when it drops below 50 metres.

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SpiceJet warned passengers that flights are likely to be disrupted on Wednesday too. “..Due to expected poor visibility in Delhi (DEL)...all departures/arrivals and their consequential flights may get affected. Passengers are requested to keep a check on their flight status,” the airline said in a post on X.

The Indian Railways, meanwhile, said 26 trains in Delhi were delayed by more than an hour on Monday due to fog in north India.

The fog has hampered flight and rail services all winter, leaving passengers stranded at airports and stations for hours, with the cascading effect of the delays throwing operations off schedule for several days.

“After the morning hours, a shallow fog was observed throughout the city. The skies were partially cloudy on Tuesday but there was ample sunlight to bring the maximum up,” said Kuldeep Srivastava, scientist at IMD.

Tuesday’s minimum temperature was a degree below normal for this time of the year. The minimum temperature on Sunday and Saturday was respectively 4.8°C and 8.5°C.

The maximum temperature on Tuesday rose to 19.5°C, a degree below normal, from 17.6°C on Monday.

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IMD has forecast that the maximum should stay around 20°C throughout the week, while the minimum should stay around 8°C. IMD qualifies it as a cold day when the maximum is 4.5 degrees or more below the normal and the minimum is below 10°C.

In the National Capital Region (NCR), Gurugram recorded a maximum of 16.4°C, while Faridabad recorded a maximum of 15.6°C. The minimum in both cities was 7.8°C.

“Wednesday should be mostly clear with very low chances of cold day conditions. The western disturbances should make their way into the Capital by the end of this week, which will bring the minimum up to 9-11°C,” said Mahesh Palawat, vice-president of private forecasting agency Skymet.

Meanwhile, Delhi clocked an air quality index (AQI) of 368 on Tuesday, in the “very poor” category, a deterioration from 333 (very poor) on Monday, according to the Central Pollution Control Board’s (CPCB) national bulletin.

CPCB classifies an AQI between 0-50 as “good”, between 51 and 100 as “satisfactory”, between 101 and 200 as “moderate”, between 201 and 300 as “poor”, between 301 and 400 as “very poor”, and more than 400 as “severe”.

According to the Air Quality Early Warning System for Delhi, AQI is likely to stay “very poor” until January 26.