Araku Valley witnesses winter chill; temp drops to 8.5° Celsius

Visakhapatnam:With the onset of winter chill, the night temperature was dropping from 2 to 4 °C below normal in several locations of ASR and Parvathipuram Manyam districts. According to Met office, the mercury will further plummet in several parts of the ASR district in the coming days.

On Tuesday morning the minimum temperature of 8.2 °C was recorded at Dumbriguda by the Regional Agriculture Research Station (RARS) at Chintapalli, which is also a primary weather station in ASR district.

Dr A. Appala Swamy, associate director of the weather station, said, that Agromet field unit (AMFU), Ananathagiri recorded a minimum temperature of 13.7 °C, Araku Valley was under the spell of winter chill with minimum temperature at 8.5 degree Celsius, Chintapalle (11.3), Dumbriguda (8.2), G. Madugula (8.4), GK. Veedhi (11.1), Hukumpeta (11.4), Koyyuru (15), Munchingiputtu (10.9), Paderu (10.8) and Pedabayalu recorded a minimum temperature of 11.9 °C.

A thick blanket of dense fog was enveloping Chintapalle, Paderu, Araku Valley and its adjoining areas, on Monday morning, resulting in visibility coming down to only 100 metres. The movement of vehicular traffic was affected for two days.

On the other, the footfall of tourists visiting hotspots has gone up. Gowri Shankar, official from the APTDC, said that nearly 15,000 tourists visited the Borra caves in the past three days.