A thick layer of fog and cold wave swept through Uttar Pradesh on Friday as more than 30 people died in fog-related road accidents in the state in the past 48 hours.
Authorities of several districts have ordered closure of schools and colleges till Saturday as they stepped up efforts to provide relief to the destitute in the cold weather.
However, the weather office in Lucknow has predicted light rainfall from Saturday for the next two days in central and eastern UP, which could give some respite from the dense fog temporarily.
Air, train and road movement have been severely affected due to fog with several places like Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi, Bareilly, Moradabad, Aligarh, Prayagraj and other places witnessing zero visibility Friday morning.
At the Lucknow airport, 17 flights were cancelled on Thursday, while on Friday, around 10 flights were postponed. At Varanasi Airport, 50% of the flights were cancelled for the past 2 days.
Due to dense fog train services were mostly affected with trains running late for more than 5 to 10 hours. Several VVIP trains like Vande Bharat, Shatabadi and Tejas were cancelled.
Traffic on the road was also affected as the UP government bus was off-road during peak fog hours.
The Meteorological Department has issued a cold day alert for Friday in 29 districts and surrounding areas of the state. The districts are Bahraich, Lakhimpur Kheri, Sitapur, Hardoi, Farrukhabad, Kannauj, Kanpur Dehat, Kanpur Nagar, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Bulandshahr, Aligarh, Mathura, Hathras, Kasganj, Etah, Agra, Firozabad, Mainpuri, Etawah, Auraiya, Bareilly, Pilibhit, and Shahjahanpur.