Magadh Mahila College students sport woollen clothes to beat the cold, in Patna on Friday. Picture by Neshat Ahmad

Patna, Nov. 18: Residents of the state capital woke up to a cold shock today. The sun had vanished behind the thick fog cover that challenged the sight of even the sharpest of eyes.

Those still sporting their summer wear were forced to look for something warm to escape the chill in the air. Though the temperature did not show any decline today — the minimum was 18ºC, three degrees above normal — most residents walked out of their homes sporting woollens and mufflers.

“It is an overnight change in the weather. Conditions were better yesterday. Today, I felt the chill for the first time this winter. I asked my wife in the morning to take out my half-sleeve sweater, which I wore to office,” said Amit Mishra, a resident of Boring Road.

Winter announced its arrival in Patna today, as the day passed without a glimpse of the sun. The dense fog refused to clear out. Strong breeze blew. Met experts claimed such windy winter days were here to stay.

“Although the maximum and minimum temperatures in the city were recorded close to normal, the dense fog today led to a low penetration of sunlight. Moreover, the atmospheric condition was compounded by easterly winds blowing at a speed of five knots. It created the wind chill conditions,” said Animesh Chanda, director, Patna Met department.

The weather department officials claimed that such windy winter condition would prevail for the next four to five days. “Both easterly and northerly winds would continue to blow across the state capital at an average speed of four to five knots for the next four to five days. Also, the temperatures (maximum and minimum) would remain close to normal. The hazy sky condition is likely to prevail, which when compounded with both easterly and northerly winds, would result in continuation of wind chill conditions,” added Chanda.

The worst affected by such weather condition are the morning flights operating from Jaiprakash Narayan International Airport. Sources said no flights were allowed to land at the airport today before 12noon because of poor visibility.

All the four morning flights — Air India’s Delhi-Patna-Delhi flight (AI 409), GoAir’s Delhi-Patna-Delhi-Bombay (G8-342) flight, Jet Airways’ Calcutta-Patna-Calcutta (9W-2853) flight and Kingfisher’s Delhi-Ranchi-Patna-Delhi (IT-3341) — arrived between 12.15pm and 1pm.

The condition was better in the northern parts of the state. “The sky was clear today and the temperature was close to normal in most parts of north Bihar. The maximum temperature hovered around 25 to 27ºC while the minimum temperature remained between 15 and 17ºC,” said Abdul Sattar, the assistant professor of meteorology at Rajendra Agriculture University, Pusa.