LAHORE: Rain in several cities in Punjab, including Lahore and upper parts of the country with snowfall over the hills, dipped temperatures on Thursday, reintroducing chill in the air.

The maximum temperature in almost all cities in Punjab dropped below 20 degrees Celsius. It was 17.5 degrees Celsius in Lahore which continued to receive intermittent light rain almost throughout the day.

And the Met office forecast more widespread rain, heavy at many places, in the country in the next three days.

It reported that Sibbi received 35mm of rain, Malamjabba 28, Sargodha 24, Noorpur Thal 23, Parachinar 22, Lower Dir 21, Dera Ismail Khan 18, Mandi Bahauddin 17, Saidu Sharif 15, Peshawar, Garhi Dupatta 13 each, Chakwal and Kalam 12 each, Bhakkar, Gujrat, Kohat and Kotli 11 each, Sialkot and Jhang 10 each, Toba Tek Singh, Islamabad, Drosh and Bahawalpur 9 each, Jhelum 8, Okara and Chitral 6 each, Gujranwala 5 and Lahore 3.

The Met office forecast fairly widespread thunderstorm-rain with snowfall over the hills, along with strong winds, over Fata, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan, Northern Balochistan and Northern Punjab, including Lahore, in the next 24 hours.

Isolated to scattered thunderstorm-rain was likely over Southern Punjab, Southern Balochistan, Upper and Central Sindh.

The spell would continue till Monday. There were chances of isolated to scattered heavy falls in these areas on Sunday and Monday.

Heavy rain was also expected over the upper catchments of the rivers Jhelum, Chenab and Ravi. This would raise the water level of these rivers and their nullahs, especially in the Sialkot region.

The Met office expected urban flooding and hailstorm in majority cities.

Published in Dawn March 6th, 2015

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