Nagpur: OMG!! Nagpur is burning!! It seems the city has been set ablaze if the temperature recorded by IMD in the city is to be believed! Two of the four Automatic weather stations (AWS) set up by IMD in Nagpur showed abnormally high temperatures, upwards of 50 degree Celsius,on Thursday, May 30, a report in local media said!
Gold Rate
thursday 06 March 2025
According to the report, on Thursday, the Nagpur AWS in the middle of the 24 hectare open agriculture field belonging to PDKV at Ramdaspeth, off North Ambazari Road, recorded a whopping 56 degree Celsius.
Similarly, the AWS at the Regional Meteorological Centre (RMC) in Sonegaon reported 54 degrees Celsius. The AWS in the fields of Central Institute of Cotton Research (CICR) at Khapri off Wardha Road showed 44 degrees Celsius. The Ramtek AWS showed 44 degrees Celsius.
On Wednesday, the Delhi station created ripples across the country after posting a historic 52.9 degree Celsius, though as per the AWS/ARG (automatic rain gauge) Networks of the IMD the data is under scrutiny.
Following the Delhi heat scare, which is believed to be India’s highest maximum temperature, the AWS/ARG networks are once again in the news. Regional meteorological officials said the AWS data shouldn’t be referred to for intense heat days as the sensors start malfunctioning beyond 38 degrees Celsius.
“The AWS sensors have a fault. After a certain threshold temperature, the recordings become unreliable. They work fine for temperatures below 38-40 degrees. This is called positive bias in scientific parlance. The expansion of requisite elements needs to be linear. But the process loses its linearity in high temperatures,” said a senior forecasting scientist at the RMC.
According to a recent study by VNIT’s climatology lab, the maximum temperature varies in Nagpur and the readings largely depend on the surrounding factors such as dense areas populated with homes, open areas with green cover, open areas without plantation etc. The study highlighted that Nagpur has local climate zones and the temperature varies significantly in each of them.
The PDKV AWS is situated with Maharajbagh Zoo on one side and Vanamati on the other. On Thursday, the temperature in the open field seemed to be higher than near the green cover of Maharajbagh road. The sensors of the AWS were completely exposed to the scorching sun without any greenery around.
A senior RMC official said the AWS sensors are imported from European countries, where the temperatures don’t rise as high as Indian cities.
The daily weather updates prepared for public consumption are prepared manually by scientists. The manual data is believed to be more reliable. The AWS data is relayed to Pune data centre, where the codes are interpreted and uploaded on AWS/ARG Networks portal in real time.
