LAHORE: Major parts of the country are likely to witness their first spell of monsoon rains from Thursday (today) to Sunday, ridding the plain areas of the prevailing extremely hot weather, said the Met department on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Lahore continued to face energy-sapping extremely hot weather, creating a great deal of inconvenience for the people.

The Met department said weak-to-moderate monsoon currents (from the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal) are penetrating northeastern parts of the country, and are likely to strengthen during the next few days. A shallow westerly wave was also likely to enter upper parts of the country on Wednesday night.

Under the influence of this weather system, rain-dust-thunderstorm associated with strong gusty winds is expected at isolated places in Malakand, Hazara, Peshawar, Mardan, Kohat, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Lahore, Sargodha, Faisalabad divisions, Islamabad and Gilgit-Baltistan from Thursday to Sunday. The same weather system is expected at isolated places in Zhob, Dera Ismail Khan, Dera Ghazi Khan and Multan divisions from Friday evening to Sunday.

More rain-thundershower (few moderate to heavy falls) associated with strong gusty winds is expected at scattered places in Islamabad, upper Punjab (Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Lahore, Sargodha, Faisalabad divisions), Kashmir from Monday to Thursday, while at isolated places in DG Khan division, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (Malakand, Hazara, Peshawar, Mardan, Kohat, Bannu and DI Khan divisions).

Published in Dawn, July 4th, 2019