June 17, 2006	Saturday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 20, 1427

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LAHORE, June 16: A shallow westerly wave and moisture from the Arabian Sea caused the first pre-monsoon heavy rain in Lahore and some other cities in Punjab, the NWFP and Northern Areas on Friday. The downpour considerably brought down temperatures in many cities, including Lahore, where the people faced extremely hot weather during the past few days.

Murree recorded the heaviest 68mm of rain, Muzaffarabad (53mm) and the Lahore meteorological office recorded 38mm of rain at its Jail Road office and 36mm at the airport.

“You can say it was a pre-monsoon downpour also caused by high temperatures in the plains of Punjab. The actual monsoon current is active near central India and will reach Pakistan by the end of this month,” meteorological department head in Lahore Riazullah Khan said.

The rain, which started in Lahore in the early hours of Friday, continued till noon with brief intervals. Many low-lying areas and streets were inundated and turned into puddles. The people had to wade through the rainwater which could not be cleared from many roads till the evening.

Attendance in offices remained thin in the morning and business activity, too, began late.

The day’s maximum temperature significantly came down to 26.4 degrees Celsius from Thursday’s 39 degrees C, offering the people the much-needed respite.

According to chief meteorologist Shaukat Awan, the rain was mainly caused by moisture from the Arabian sea reaching here for the past around three days and the weak westerly. There was no moisture from the Bay of Bengal, the originator of the monsoon activity, otherwise the rain would have been much heavier, he said.

It was light to moderate in intensity and covered upper Punjab, the NWFP and Northern Areas. The westerly was gradually moving eastwards and there could be more rain after two or three days, he said.

Mr Khan said the monsoon had begun in India but it was not active so far. The activity had reached only up to Madras Coast, south of New Delhi and there was no rain generating system over the Bay of Bengal, he said.

The local Met office reported that Garhi Dupatta received 31.4mm of rain, Islamabad (45.7mm), Rawalpindi (13mm), Jhelum (14.2mm), Faisalabad (3mm), Sargodha (4mm), Sialkot (7mm), Mandi Bahauddin (1mm), Kakul (16.7mm) and Kotli (34.4mm).

It expected more scattered rain in Lahore, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Multan, Dera Ghazi Khan and Bahawalpur divisions during the next 24 hours.