Skip to main content

The Industrial Revolution's Birthplace


July 22, 2013 – News stories about the recent heat wave in England may not, at first hearing, sound all that alarming to American ears.  Temperatures in the 80’s and 90’s constitute a very normal part of American summers, particularly in the middle of the country.   Grassfires measured in “football pitches” may cause quizzical looks, and not much more.  The fact remains, however, that nearly 800 people have died because of the ongoing abnormally high temperatures.
First of all, anyone living at the latitude of the British Isles is simply not accustomed to hot temperatures.  It is true that the blood of people living in northern climates thickens, while the opposite occurs to people who live in the south.  We can be grateful this is true – it’s a natural defense against becoming too cold or too hot.  When “normal” gets stood on its head – and we are all becoming acquainted with how that feels – what “normally” works, doesn’t.

It’s always surprising to me that people who smoke need to be told not to dispose of their lit cigarettes by throwing them into dry grass.  That goes for Americans at least as much as everybody else.   Out West, this simple act can result in thousands of acres of forest burning.  The English are being shocked into awareness by the scores of fires burning in their country right now.   They’re small, when compared to our western fires, but dangerously close to the city.   Fire is fire the world over: it’s frightening, it’s polluting, and it can be very destructive.
If you’ve never been lucky enough to visit England, it’s a magical place.  London is the City of Cities, offering anything you could possibly want.  The history, majestic buildings, and endless opportunities for exploration could fill a lifetime.  The countryside is gorgeous and green, the walking paths opening onto idyllic views that are never closed off merely because they belong to somebody.  Everyone can enjoy them.

England is green because it usually enjoys lots of rain.  Indeed, for Englanders, that is what makes England – England.  Drought and high temperatures are different enough to be very unwelcome.  I believe I’m correct in saying that air conditioning is unknown in most parts.  The part of me that has lived in Texas and North Carolina chuckles a little bit when I see articles in British newspapers about how to dress in the heat.  Wearing relatively little probably feels very odd to them!
Dealing with highs in the 90’s (it may get up to 95F this week in London) isn’t easy for anybody.  Believe it or not, a newly-poured road in the city of Cambridge has begun to melt, collecting in a large wave at the side of the road!  An average of 21 wildfires are burning every day.  Apparently most have been started by cigarette butts or barbecues (I’d never heard of a disposable barbecue before, but it seems they have them in England).  Anyone unacquainted with the relatively recent spate of terrible flooding in England needs to realize that this small country is being battered by everything Mother Nature has in her bag of tricks.

What happens next is up to each one of us.

 

With thanks to The Telegraph (UK).

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Great March for Climate Action

December 23, 2013 – Have you heard about The Great March for Climate Action?   I just learned about it today.   Organizers have determined it will take them 246 days to march from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C.   They are looking for 1,000 people – 20 from each state – to participate.   The march is stopping in many, many locations along the way so that locals can participate for as little as a day, or as long as they like. The march is Ed Fallon’s brainchild.   Ed, along with most of his staff members, is from Iowa, where he served as a state legislator for fourteen years.   He currently hosts a radio program called Fallon Forum.   Fallon began his career as a social activist coordinating the Iowa section of the Great Peace March in 1986.  Ed bases his approach on Great Marches of the past.  Women suffragists marched on Washington on March 3, 1913; Gandhi led the Salt March in India on March 12, 1930; Dr. King led the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery

Greenland: A State of Rapid Collapse

 September 1, 2020 The good news, such as it is, goes like this: the suspense is over. No need to guess about whether sea level rise will be life-altering by the end of this century or not. It will, at least for the 40 percent of humankind which lives on or near a coastline. That's because all the ice on Greenland is going to melt, according to researchers at Ohio State University (yes, yes, I know - it's THE Ohio State University. Get over yourselves.) Their research appeared in the journal Nature Communications Earth and Environment in August. Total meltdown will take 10,000 years, but enough will have melted by 2100 to cause sea level rise of approximately three feet. That will cover a lot of coastal property, a loss made worse by storms and hurricanes. How have researchers reached this conclusion? By studying almost 40 years of satellite data. Glaciers on Greenland have shrunk so much since the year 2000 that even if global warming came to a complete stop, they would contin