Less DTR robs winter of its chill!

By our Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI, Jan 2: December has gone and it is second instant of January on Tuesday. Yet there is no chill to the marrow! What has gone wrong! This is what Guwahatians and others in the State have been racking their brains this winter – missing its very essence, the chill.

Sources in the Meteorological Department have answers to what has led to the present situation in the State this winter. Citing findings of researches a source in the department said: “The diurl temperature range (DTR) – the difference between the maximum and minimum temperature during the day – has much to do with the chill, the very essence of winter in the Northeast. When DTR falls in a region people there don’t feel much cold but they feel colder when DTR goes up. This year the DTR is much less and that robs this winter of its chill.”

The maximum temperature on December 31, 2017 was 27.1 degree Celsius (3.5 degree Celsius more than normal temperature) and the minimum temperature was 12 degree Celsius (1.7 degree Celsius more than normal temperature) in Guwahati, thereby the DTR was 15.1 degree Celsius. The maximum temperature on January 1, 2018 in the city was 27.4 degree Celsius and the minimum temperature was 12 degree Celsius, putting the DTR at 15.4 degree Celsius. Likewise, on January 2 the maximum temperature in the city is 26.4 degree Celsius and the minimum temperature is 13.2 degree Censiul, putting the DTR at 13.2 degree Celsius.

Meanwhile, the source forecast dense fog in Assam, Meghalaya, galand, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura on January 3 and 4, 2018.

The source also attributed the winter without chill to rampant deforestation in the State.