Heat wave claims over 900 lives in India, Delhi records 46 degree

mangaloretoday.com

New Delhi, May 26: Heat wave that has gripped large parts of the country has killed nearly 900 people, mostly in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, even as Delhi sizzled on Tuesday with the mercury soaring to almost 46 °C.
 
In Andhra Pradesh, 55 people succumbed to sunstroke while 35 more deaths were reported in Telangana.
 
Andhra Pradesh’s deputy chief minister N Chinna Rajappa said that 551 people had died in the state till Monday while disaster management officials in Telangana confirmed 215 deaths.

 

 
In Delhi, zebra crossings at some places melted as the India Meteorological Department (IMD) reported that the city had recorded a maximum temperature of 45.5°C.
 
Few people could be seen on the streets because of the oppressive heat. Even Night time temperatures hovered around the 30-degree mark.
 
According to the IMD, most parts of India will remain in the grip of high temperatures for the rest of the week. The department issued “red box” warnings for Odisha, Jharkhand and coastal Andhra Pradesh.
 
A “red box” warning usually means high chances of heatstroke, dehydration and fatality with temperatures inching upwards of 45°C and conditions worsened by a constant dry, sweltering wind.
 
The monsoon, expected to hit the southern coastline on May 31, is expected to bring relief from the high temperatures, officials said.

In Telangana, a maximum temperature of 44.8°C was recorded in Ramagundam city on Monday. Jangameswarapuram in Andhra Pradesh was two notches higher at 46.8°C.
 
A scorching sun baked northern parts and the coastal region of Karnataka with day temperatures climbing to 45°C. Kalaburagi and Bidar districts were the worst hit areas, though state capital Bengaluru is expected to have a partly cloudy sky with the possibility of rain or thunderstorm, officials said.
 
The heat wave was mainly triggered by an abrupt end to pre-monsoon showers and missing storms. A brewing cyclonic weather pattern in the Arabian Sea two weeks ago lost steam quickly, while depressions, or rain-causing systems, in the Bay of Bengal headed off towards the northeast states which are getting plentiful rains.
 
Such a weather pattern meant a large north-to-south belt – from Rajasthan to Andhra Pradesh – became home to uninterrupted “settled” weather conditions, marked by a strong, early summer sun for more than a week.
 
Authorities advised people to stay indoors and consume plenty of fluids, and experts warned that there could be large-scale power outages in several parts of north India if the heat wave continued, bringing back memories of a blackout in 2012 that affected nearly 600 million people.