UK’s hottest June: ‘The population should have been prepared for this’
Schools are closing, public transport is slowing and cooling items are flying off shelves as Britons swelter. London, United Kingdom – “At midnight yesterday, the
Schools are closing, public transport is slowing and cooling items are flying off shelves as Britons swelter. London, United Kingdom – “At midnight yesterday, the temperature in my home was 31 degrees, which I could not control,” said Bijal Shah, a pharmacist who has spent the past fortnight trying and failing to buy a portable air conditioning unit or even an industrial fan to cool his five-month-old grandson who is unwell. Some cooling items have waits of two to three weeks for delivery, a real challenge for families like his who are caring for someone vulnerable. It is a small but telling detail in a week when Britain has broken a June heat record that had stood since 1976. The mercury hit 36.1C in Gosport, Hampshire, the hottest day of the month ever recorded in the UK. The Met Office has a red extreme heat warning running across large areas of southern England and there is a possibility that temperatures could reach 40C before the week is out. “We’ve not had a surge in enquiries or requests for prescription deliveries,” said Shah from behind the counter in his air conditioned pharmacy, as he dispenses supplements to a heavily pregnant lady keeping cool with a fan around her neck. “Not as much as I thought we would have”. More than 1,000 schools across southern England have shut early or closed entirely this week. One in Taunton, in the southwest, told parents that the conditions made it “increasingly difficult to ensure the wellbeing, comfort and safety” of pupils and staff.
Soaked through after an hour’s work, Peter Wride, a gardener, recalled the 1976 heatwave. “We survived that June in school. No lessons were cancelled, schools didn’t shut,” he said. Back then, pupils cooled off outside in the shade to enjoy story time and a breeze, rather than being kept indoors in a school he described as “a mini greenhouse”. He believes the response this week has tipped too far towards panic. Transport for London has warned of disruption to Tube and rail services and Network Rail has asked passengers in red warning zones to travel only if strictly necessary, as the heat threatens overhead lines and signalling. London Ambulance Service has deployed more than 400 extra ambulance crews on the road this week as temperatures soared, with fire engines and police vehicles also weaving through busy roads of the capital every few minutes. Major events have also been impacted – the University of Bath postponed its 60th Anniversary Adelard gathering at Bath Abbey, citing the heat and likely travel disruption. In London, a Climate Action Week panel on how cities can adapt to extreme heat was cancelled after organisers found the London School of Economics venue had no cooling system in place, a problem facing much of the city’s older buildings. “If this was expected in advance, the population should have been more prepared for this,” Shah said. At home, that gap between warning and preparedness is very real. His grandson, in and out of hospital and sleep-fed because he cannot bottle-feed on his own, has been vomiting continuously since last week, and every bit of lost hydration matters when there is no way to cool the room he sleeps in.
The BriefWire