KARACHI, June 18: Duststorm and rain, which lashed the city for a brief interval on Wednesday evening accompanied by peals of thunder, reduced visibility to 100 metres and sent people on roads scrambling for shelter.

The chief meteorologist at the Pakistan Meteorological Department, Arif Mehmood, said that the rain and duststorm weather system had developed in India first. “We had not expected the weather system to travel so fast. It came to Karachi earlier than we expected. But it will not last long. This weather system will soon be over.”

The Met Office said: “After the duststorm, visibility improved and became one kilometre. Under normal circumstances, visibility is about eight kilometres.”

They said that the observatories at the Airport and Faisal Base had received 16.3mm and 16mm of rain respectively. But the observatories at Masroor Base, Pakistan Quarters and North Karachi had received a trace of rain, that is less than one millimetre.