Feeling the freeze: It’s official: Isloo facing coldest winter in three years

As temperatures fall to -2 Celsius, people scramble to warm themselves.

ISLAMABAD:

The residents of federal capital are amid the harshest winter in three years, with the mercury regularly dropping to subzero levels. It was in 2008 that a temperature as low as -2 Celsius was last recorded.

A Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) official told APP on Friday that “extreme cold weather conditions were recorded in the federal capital three years back, when temperatures dropped to minus three Celsius.”

This time so far, the temperature fell to as low as -2 Celsius in Islamabad on December 25 and 26, 2011, and on January 8, 9 and 12. In the last five years, according to PMD, the lowest temperature recorded in the months of December and January was -1 Celsius in 2010, -3 Celsius in 2008 and -2 Celsius in 2007. The temperature did not drop below zero in 2009. The lowest recorded temperature in the history of Islamabad was -4.3 Celsius in 1984, a PMD official said.

PMD Chief Meteorologist Ghulam Rasul identified January as the coldest month, with temperatures usually falling below zero. However, snowfall over the Margalla Hills in the last spell was due to a sudden drop in temperature and may be considered an unusual phenomenon as it last snowed in 2006, he said.

The sudden drop in temperature has also taken Islamabadis by surprise. Ahmed, who lived in Canada for two years, said, “Even in Toronto our houses weren’t this cold. Erratic gas supply [in some areas of the city] makes it even more unbearable.”

Zahra, a resident of F-8, said, “Been wearing layers. It’s worse than London. It’s never been this bad.”

The worst might not be over yet. According to PMD weather advisory, more rain with snowfall over the hills is expected over upper parts of the country on Saturday and Sunday. A westerly wave approaching western parts of the country will result in scattered rain with snowfall over the hills in northeast Balochistan on Friday night and Saturday. Scattered rain with snowfall over the hills is also expected in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, upper Punjab, Gilgit-Baltistan and Kashmir. More snowfall is also predicted over the hills of Murree and Galliyat over the weekend.

*With input from APP

Published in The Express Tribune, January 14^th, 2012.