37 forest fires ravage Britain
37 forest fires ravage Britain
19 July 2013
published by http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com
United Kingdom — Large grass and forest fires broke out across Britain on Friday following the country’s worst heat wave in seven years.
The scorching temperatures resulted in a spate of massive grass fires – some as large as having destroyed fields as large as four football fields across London, the worst since the summer of 2006. Roads also caved in while train lines melted.
London’s fire fighters had a busy day at work attending 37 grass fires during the 24 period from 4pm on Wednesday, 17 July to 4pm Thursday, 18 July.
London Fire Brigade’s head of operations Dave Brown said, “We’re attending the highest number of grass fires since 2006. Grass fires can cause a great deal of damage to open spaces and wildlife.”
Karl Kitchen from the Met Office said about wildfires, “There is an amber alert for wildfires in South East and Southern England. It means wildfires are likely to be difficult to control. This is in place until Sunday evening when there will be an update. Other areas are in Elevated category (vigilance).”
The biggest grass fire dealt with by Brigade crews so far this year occurred on Thursday on Mitcham Common where an area around the size of four football pitches was damaged.
In the same afternoon, fire crews tackled a grass fire on Bridge Road in Erith. An area the size of three football pitches was destroyed.
Brown said many fires are caused by discarded cigarettes and matches or glass bottles which can concentrate the sun’s rays on to parched grass and shrubbery.
Fire-fighters have attended nearly 2,000 grass fires this year and this number is expected to rise with the hot weather expected to last for at least the next few days.
Meanwhile the met office fears that temperatures in Britain could breach the 35 degree centigrade mark next week that could force the country to announce a level-four alert marking a national emergency.
With temperatures in most part of Britain hovering around the 32 degree centigrade mark on Friday, UK is now on the grip of a severe and prolonged heat wave for the first time in seven years.
The Met office said the hot spell of weather is set to continue through the weekend, with the high temperatures lasting well into next week.
High pressure will continue to dominate over Saturday and Sunday, bringing dry and very warm weather for many.
Paul Gundersen, chief forecaster at the Met Office said, “As we head into the weekend the emphasis on the highest temperatures shifts to the western side of the UK where we will see temperatures into the high twenties. Further east, with more cloud around, temperatures will be slightly lower than we have seen during the week with highs of 25 degree centigrade.”
The Met office said, “By Monday temperatures could once again be into the low 30s with some very warm night time temperatures developing. As the heat and humidity builds, the risk of thunderstorms increases.”
Research by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine has estimated the death toll for the first nine days of the heat wave at between 540 and 760 people in England alone.
Ambulance services have already seen a 30% increase in the past three days.
A Level 3 is triggered as soon as the Met Office confirms there is a 90% chance of heat wave conditions, when temperatures are high enough over threshold levels to have a significant effect on health on at least 2 consecutive days.
The Met said, “We’ve now had 11 days with temperatures over 28°C somewhere in the UK, making it the longest hot spell since 2006. The UK mean temperature up to the 15th July is 16.1°C, a degree above the long term average for the whole of the month. The days have been particularly warm so far, with the average maximum temperature for the UK being 21.3°C, 2 degrees above normal”.
“Rainfall for the UK from 1-15 July was 9.2mm. At this stage we would expect to have seen about 48% of the full month average, however we have only seen 12%. We have seen less than 5 mm widely across much of England and parts of eastern Scotland (many locations with only 1 or 2mm). Up to the 15th we have seen 132 hours of sunshine across the UK, which is 77% of the full month average. Again, we would have expected to have seen about 48% at this point in an ‘average’ month”.
To put this in context, the driest July on record across the UK was in 1955 when there was 30.6mm of rain. With only 9mm of rain so far in the UK this July, this is likely to be a very dry month but – with two weeks to go – it’s too early to say where it will end up in the national series dating back to 1910.
For the longer running England and Wales precipitation record which dates back to 1766, the record driest July was in 1825 with just 8 mm of rain. England and Wales have seen just 4mm so far this month.
With regards to sunshine hours, 1955 is the sunniest July on record with 256 hours of sunshine, with 2006 close behind with 253 hours.
The warmest July on record is 2006 with a UK mean temperature of 17.8 °C; this is also the warmest month in the national record which goes back to 1910.
