KARACHI, Jan 24: A cold weather snap gripped the city which received the second winter showers of the season on Monday. "A low-pressure weather system entered Pakistan from Iran recently.

It was responsible for rains in the Makran coast. Currently, it is over Karachi, but it will move into other areas of Sindh shortly," a high-ranking official of the Pakistan Meteorological Department told Dawn by telephone.

"The rain in Karachi will intensify the ongoing cold wave and temperatures will dip further. It might rain in Karachi till Tuesday afternoon," said the chief meteorologist, Arif Mehmood.

Mr Mehmood said winter showers were a regular annual feature and the city received rains almost always in December, January and February. He recalled that Karachi received the first winter showers on New Year's Eve.

"According to our data, the average rainfall in January is six millimetres. But the city received 43.6 millimetres of rain on Jan 14, 1976 - the highest rainfall received by the city within 24 hours in January. The rainfall in the same month totalled 66.8 millimetres," he explained.

The Met Office told Dawn on Monday that all the observatories in the city had recorded less than one millimetre of rain. "The maximum and minimum temperatures on Monday were 23 degrees centigrade and 18.8 degrees centigrade.

Humidity rose to 47 per cent from 21 per cent on Sunday," it said. According to a Met Office forecast, the city will remain cloudy on Tuesday with chances of rain or thunderstorm.