A thick blanket of fog remains in Delhi and other parts of the country on Sunday morning. As many as 22 trains and 150 flights connecting the national capital have been delayed. RK Puram recorded the minimum temperature of 7 degrees this morning.
Visibility appeared to be zero in the airport area. The Delhi airport itself had issued a fog alert last night, urging flyers to contact the airlines for updated flight information.
Airlines have also reported 'weather challenges' in northern India with budget carrier IndiGo saying their flight schedules may be disrupted due to the bad weather.
SpiceJet has warned that departure/arrival and subsequent flights may be affected due to poor visibility in Delhi, Amritsar, Jammu, Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Guwahati, Patna, Bagdogra and Darbhanga,
In Chennai, where Pongal celebrations begin today, five inbound international flights were diverted to Hyderabad and 18 flights were delayed. The Chennai airport has suspended landings for at least an hour.
Very dense fog has been reported in Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu Division, Chandigarh, Assam and southern interior Karnataka, while parts of Tripura, coastal Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu reported moderate fog.
According to the IMD, zero visibility has been recorded for the first time in Ganganagar, Patiala, Ambala, Chandigarh, Palam, Safdarjung, Bareilly, Lucknow, Bahraich, Varanasi, Prayagraj and Tezpur.
The air quality has also dropped to 'severe' category in several areas in Delhi. The weather bureau has issued a red warning due to cold and fog and expects dense fog in Delhi until Tuesday.
Friday was the first cold wave day of the season, with temperatures dropping to 3.9 degrees Celsius. Saturday was the coldest night as the temperature dropped to the coldest of the season at 3 degrees in Aya Nagar, Delhi's last village on the Mehrauli-Gurgaon Road.