Northeast continues to reel from hot spell, max temp of 38°C in Guwahati

GUWAHATI: The hot spell across the northeast continued on Friday, with Cherrapunji in Meghalaya - which was once the wettest place on the planet - experiencing a maximum temperature of 30.3 degree Celsius, which is 8.1 above normal. Guwahati registered a maximum temperature of 38 degree Celsius for the second consecutive day, even as the mercury continued to soar in other parts of the state as well.


The temperature remained high across the state on Friday, with Dibrugarh (37.2 degree Celsius), North Lakhimpur (38 degree Celsius) and several other places experiencing a dry spell due to a shortage of rainfall over the last few days. This comes after high temperatures were recorded in Guwahati (38 Celsius), North Lakhimpur (38.2 Celsius), Jorhat (37.7 Celsius),

Tezpur

(37 Celsius), Dibrugarh (37.4 Celsius) and Pasighat in

Arunachal Pradesh

(36.8 Celsius) on Thursday.

To make matters worse, frequent power cuts across various parts of the state, especially in the rural areas, made the conditions more unbearable. People in the city remained confined within their houses and offices for most of the day to try to beat the heat. "We have been trying to quench our thirst by taking in coconut water and soft drinks during this spell of hot weather. For the last couple of days, the summer heat has been unbearable here in Guwahati. Hopefully, rains will come in soon as conditions have been unbearable during this month," said Sukanya Singh, a resident of Chatribari area of the city.

A spokesperson of the Guwahati-based Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC) of the India Meteorological Department's (IMD) said the maximum temperature recorded in Guwahati on Friday was 38 degree Celsius. Silchar in the

Barak Valley

of Assam and

Itanagar

and Pasighat in Arunachal Pradesh recorded a maximum temperature of 38.4 degree Celsius, which was the highest across the northeast on Friday.

Data available with the RMC showed that light to moderate rain occurred at many places across Mizoram and light rain occurred at a few places in Nagaland during the last 24 hours. Isolated places across Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and Meghalaya experienced light to moderate rain while the dry spell prevailed across Manipur and Tripura during the period.

The RMC weather forecast for the next 24 hours has predicted that rain and thundershowers are very likely to occur at a few places across Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura and at isolated places across Arunachal Pradesh. This may bring some much needed relief to people across the northeast during the weekend.


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