Fresh snowfall forces closure of Srinagar-Jammu national highway

, Feb 5: The Srinagar-Jammu

, connecting Kashmir with the rest of the country, was on Wednesday closed for traffic as many places in the Valley, including the plains, received fresh

.

"The Srinagar-Jammu highway is closed for traffic due to rain and snowfall at many places along the route," a spokesman of the traffic department said.

Bad weather conditions in winters force the closure of the 294-km arterial highway, the only all-weather road link connecting Kashmir Valley with the rest of the country.

The higher reaches and plains of the Valley, including Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir, received fresh snowfall and rain on Wednesday, with the MeT department predicting more rains or snow over the next 24 hours.

Meanwhile, Srinagar recorded a minimum temperature of 1.0 degrees Celsius, a slight drop from the previous night's 1.7 degree Celsius, an official of the MeT department said.

The city received snow and rains equivalent to 2.6 mm of rainfall during the night.

Mercury in Qazigund - the gateway town to Kashmir Valley - settled at 0.2 degrees Celsius as compared to 0.4 degrees Celsius the previous night.

The town received snow and rains equivalent to 3.6 mm of rainfall till 8:30am.

The mercury in the tourist resort of Pahalgam settled at a low of minus 1.2 degrees Celsius, a degree drop from minus 0.2 degrees Celsius the previous night, the official said.

Bad weather conditions in winters force the closure of the 294-km highway.

The resort received 11.5 cm of snow during the night.

The famous ski-resort of Gulmarg recorded a low of minus 4.2 degrees Celsius, two degrees up from the previous night's minus 6.2 degrees Celsius, the official said, adding that the resort was colder than Leh town in the Ladakh region for the second consecutive day.

Gulmarg received 16.6 cm of fresh snowfall, he said.

The mercury in Kokernag, in south Kashmir, settled at a low of minus 0.2 degrees Celsius on Tuesday night as against the previous night's minimum of minus 0.5 degrees Celsius.

The mercury in Kupwara, which recorded a low of zero degrees Celsius the previous night, settled at 0.2 degrees Celsius on Tuesday night.

The north Kashmir town received 23.6 mm of snow and rains.

Leh, in the frontier region of Ladakh, recorded a low of minus 3.9 degrees Celsius, as compared to the previous night's minus 3.6 degrees Celsius.

Kargil was the coldest place in the state with a low of minus 8 degrees Celsius, an increase of over a degree as compared to minus 9.4 degrees Celsius the previous night.

IANS