Capital chilled to the bone as max mercury drops to 15.6°C

The Capital recorded its coldest day of the season on Wednesday with a peak temperature of 15.6°C as icy winds and a band of heavy fog in the higher altitudes kept the city in the thick of winter.

- Jasjeev Gandhiok and Aheli Das

The maximum was 4°C lower than average, not 4.5 degrees the threshold at which it qualifies for a "cold day" - but an analysis of ambient temperatures taken every three hours since December 31 shows Delhi is colder than peak highs suggest, and those figures are outlier recordings of when the sun briefly broke through the fog.

The peak temperature usually comes at a point somewhere in between 3pm and 4pm. The three-hour readings recorded by the India Meteorological Department (IMD) show the ambient temperature to be in the low double digits (10-11°C) for most parts of the day between 8.30am and 5.30pm, except for some hours from 2.30pm to 5.30pm.