Fog recedes but no relief from winter chill in Uttar Pradesh

Lucknow, Dec 11: Even as the dense fog that blanketed the Uttar Pradesh capital and neighbouring regions for the last five days receded on Thursday, there was no let up in the willy winter conditions.

Met officials have warned of dense fog accompanied by rains in the next few days. They also said cold wave conditions in the state would further compound in the coming days and the mercury would fall further.

The minimum temperature on Wednesday dropped to 5.2 degrees celsius, which was four degrees below normal while the maximum temperature was recorded at 21.8 degrees celsius, which was three degrees below normal.

Weathermen said the "actual cold wave" had still not hit the city and the state and was likely to arrive over the weekend and would continue with a long spell.

Owing to the dense fog and icy chill, many trains in the Northern Railways(NR)and the North-Eastern Railways (NER) were running behind schedule, rail officials informed.

"Almost 90 per cent of the trains to and from Lucknow are running much behind their schedule," an official informed.

Major trains whose schedule has gone haywire because of dnse fog and inclement weather include Saryu-Yamuna Express (late by 21 hours), Marudhar Express (late by 5 hours), Patna-Kota Express (late by 8 hours) and Sapt Kranti Express, which was running late by 10.5 hours.

Several flights from the Chaudhary Charan Singh airport in Amausi were also flying late. A flight from Oman was diverted to Jaipur because of poor visibility while other flights were landed late, only after the visibility improved post-noon Wednesday.

Visibility problem continues to hit the flight operations on Thursday, an airport official told IANS.

IANS