The weekend for the tourists and local population could not have been more rejuvenating as the city got draped in a white thick blanket of snow with the second major spell of snow in the New Year covering trees, hills and rooftops.
With reports of heavy snowfall spreading like a wildfire in the plains of Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh and New Delhi, Shimla which was seeing a lull season of tourists with hotel occupancies gradually reducing, saw a sudden spurt of tourist footfall on the weekend and by Saturday noon entire Mall Road and Ridge Ground of the city was abuzz with visitors. Enthusiastic tourists were seen clicking pictures and playing with snow, Children were seen rolling in the snow, a scene which was nothing less than a white play ground. Entire day several parts of Shimla district witnessed snow which started on Friday evening in the city.
Snowfall in the city started at around 10 pm on Friday and continued till 7 am on Saturday morning recording around near two feet snow. This heavy snowfall in Shimla disrupted the traffic with milk and newspaper supply reaching late in the afternoon. Public transport was severely hampered as Himachal Road Transport Corporation (HRTC) cancelled the plying of buses to upper Shimla areas and high altitude districts like Kinnaur and lahaul and Spiti. For Kinnaur, few buses plied through Basantpur route.
The heavy snowfall brought cheers to the apple orchardists as people were anxiously waiting for the heavy snowfall for quite long. Bad weather conditions were prevailing for quite some time in the State but snowfall eluded due to rise in temperature. The first snowfall of the New Year was witnessed on January 11 but it was moderate and was not sufficient to provide the necessary chilling hours to the apple plantation. The first snowfall of the season was witnessed on December 22 but that too was moderate.
lack of snowfall this season had made the tourists move towards Srinagar and Kashmir, which was witnessing heavy snowfall since December drawing the worry line for the tourism industry in the State. Shimla meteorological centre had forecasted that bad weather conditions will prevail for couple of days after which dry weather conditions will prevail in the State.