The Tunnel of Doom: Air-Pollution Season in Delhi

When I flew into Delhi in late October, the setting was strangely pleasant. First, it was raining; the city seemed to be experiencing the remnants of Cyclone Arnab, which had recently hit India’s east coast. And because of the rain, the air was relatively clean; the Air Quality Index (AQI) was hovering around 200. But — like when you climb into the ride cart at the Fun Fair — you know the happy, placid beginning is too good to last. Sure enough, today, the ride began, and we entered the tunnel of doom; I woke up to an AQI of over 500. My phone labeled it as “hazardous.” The World Health Organization (WHO) considers a PM2.5 (particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or smaller) concentration above 15 µg/m³ (micrograms per cubic meter) as unsafe; the Delhi reading was 425 µg/m³. Our PM10 (particulate matter with a diameter of 10 micrometers or smaller) reading of 489 was more than ten times the WHO’s recommended level of 45 µg/m³.

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