LAHORE, May 10: A change in the wind direction brought Arabian sea moisture to the city on Wednesday creating a bit of mugginess.

“This is a monsoon feature and the weather would return to its normal pattern of May in Lahore on Thursday (today),” Chief Meteorologist Shaukat Awan said.

The maximum temperature in the city was 42 degrees C and the minimum 25 degrees C with 44 per cent humidity in the morning and 25 per cent in the evening.

The high percentage of moisture along with high temperature made weather oppressive and turned desert coolers ineffective.

According to Mr Awan, the wind direction changed from north-west to south-west after the windstorms in plains of the province around three days ago. Accentuation of the seasonal low over Balochistan because of persistent high temperatures there, in interior Sindh and southern Punjab was another contributing factor.

Incursion of moisture from the Arabian sea was a monsoon feature. But unlike the monsoon activity, the layer of moisture on Wednesday and earlier was not too high.

The current ceased to approach Lahore on Wednesday and the wind direction would resume its routine north-west pattern of the month during the night.

However, Mr Awan, said southern Punjab would continue to have increased humidity during the next at least 24 hours.

The local Met office has, in the meantime, forecast hot and dry weather all over the province during the next 24 hours. It said with the stoppage of the moisture from the Arabian sea, temperatures would further increase during this week.