Maharashtra roasts as mercury soars up to 46 degrees

Heat wave conditions gripped large parts of Maharashtra with the mercury soaring to 46 degrees Celsius in Chandrapur and its Brahmapuri sub-district in Vidarbha region and hovering between 41-45 degrees in many other parts, the IMD said here on Monday.

Mumbai was relatively comfortable at average 35 degrees, but people were greatly inconvenienced with the high humidity levels averaging at 82 percent.

Mahabaleshwar, the famous hill-station known for its year-long salubrious climate, was nearly as hot as Mumbai at 34 degrees, virtually driving away the tourists.

On the other end, the coastal regions of Palghar, Thane, Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg, the temperatures averaged between 32-34 degrees.

Other cities also sizzled - Nagpur, Wardha, Jalgaon, and Nanded recorded 45 degrees, Parbhani, Amravati, and Akola 44, Ahmednagar, Malegaon, Solapur, Osmanabad, and Yavatmal 43, while Aurangabad, Buldhana, Pune, and Satara were a little lower at 41 degrees.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has warned that similar weather conditions are expected to prevail over the state during the 2-3 days with little or no respite from the sizzling heat.

In a specific warning, the IMD has said heat wave conditions are likely to prevail from Tuesday in parts of Nashik, Jalgaon, Ahmednagar, Satara, Sangli, Solapur, Beed and Nanded, continuing till Wednesday.

It has attributed the soaring temperatures to a trough from North Telangana to East-Central Arabian Sea across north interior Karnataka, which is now running from North Telangana to Konkan with an embedded upper air cyclonic circulation above North Telangana and neighbourhood, extending upto 0.9 kms above the mean sea level.