Heavy rainfall and thunderstorm lashed the national capital on Thursday bringing down the maximum temperature to 18.1 degree Celsius.
The city recorded 23.7 mm rainfall till 5.30 p.m, making Thursday the rainiest January day in the capital this century.
The IMD’s weather records since 2000 revealed that the 23.7 mm rainfall – recorded at Safdarjung from 8:30 am to 5:30 pm – was more than the previous wettest day in the month, 21 mm on January 18, 2013.
According to the Met department's forecast, Friday will be partly cloudy, with the maximum and minimum temperatures likely to hover around 17 degrees and 14 degrees Celsius, respectively.
"It will be a partly cloudy day on Friday. However, no rain is expected," an IMD official said.
The minimum temperature on Thursday was recorded at 16 degrees Celsius, seven notches above the season's average.
The rain was the result of a major weather system that hit north India, bringing widespread rain in the plains and heavy snowfall at many places in J&K, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
Hailstorms were reported from Hisar, Jalandhar, Kapurthala and other parts of Punjab and Haryana.
“It was a very well marked and active western disturbance that resulted in moisture being sucked into Rajasthan and the rest of northwest India from the Arabian Sea,” Ravinder Vishen, head of IMD's Regional Weather Forecasting Centre, was quoted by Times of India as saying.
“The capital is unlikely to see very chilly weather because another western disturbance that's likely to hit J&K on Sunday will prevent incursion of cold winds into NCR from the north,” he added.
Also, several stations in the city recorded higher rainfall than Safdarjung on Thursday – Najafgarh saw 31mm, Ridge 29.3mm, Palam 28.7mm and Lodhi Road 29.3mm.
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