#london smog

[scholarofgloom]

[nightmarefoxy69]

The Great Smog of London is canon to Tokyo Mew Mew

[columboscreens]

[thefisherqueen]

It was a September evening, and not yet seven o’clock, but the day had been a dreary one, and a dense drizzly fog lay low upon the great city. Mud-coloured clouds drooped sadly over the muddy streets. Down the Strand the lamps were but misty splotches of diffused light which threw a feeble circular glimmer upon the slimy pavement. The yellow glare from the shop-windows streamed out into the steamy, vaporous air, and threw a murky, shifting radiance across the crowded thoroughfare. There was, to my mind, something eerie and ghost-like in the endless procession of faces which flitted across these narrow bars of light,—sad faces and glad, haggard and merry. Like all human kind, they flitted from the gloom into the light, and so back into the gloom once more. I am not subject to impressions, but the dull, heavy evening, with the strange business upon which we were engaged, combined to make me nervous and depressed. I could see from Miss Morstan’s manner that she was suffering from the same feeling.

When the air quality in your city is so bad you can't help but writing it into your novels again and again and again

[oatbugs]

she says my heart is yours, from the caspian shores.

[ohbutwheresyourheart]

every so often I feel incredibly cheated that england, fabled land of thick and atmospheric fogs in historical fiction, actually rarely gets a decent fog going these days

[axel-draws]

Pair of studies done of 1952 London done for a class. One traditional, one digital

[sea-menace]

Standing on top of a hill and witnessing your city on the dawn light, the flat clouded sky letting that golden light become muted to where staring the way of the rising sun no longer hurts, standing in that cold and looking upon these great two cites where millions of people live.

[lesfillesennoir]

[catgirlcommie]

my actual most controversial opinion is that im pro the creation of a machine that grinds orphans into dust.

[racunboy645]

[cowfolkquinn]

thinking and learning about the great smog of london today

[sixthousandbees]

so with the breathing thing, the average person apparently can hold their breath for 30-90 seconds. I just did a couple tests and with prep I got to 100 seconds, and then a second test later got me the full two minutes on a single gulp of air, no prep.

I am pleased I did not lie

[inspectorspacetimerevisited]

While it may have been a common event during the Victorian era,

the Inspector has encountered terrible fogs at other times, usually leading him/her on a hunt for something that does not belong in London in that year.

[leparoledelmondo]

Grande smog

Durante l'inverno del 1952 la città di Londra fu colpita da un episodio di inquinamento atmosferico noto come "Grande Smog”: un'alta pressione anticiclonica si posizionò sopra la valle del Tamigi portando a temperature molto basse che indussero le persone ad aumentare l'uso del carbone per riscaldare le proprie case. Il fumo prodotto dalla combustione del carbone, ricco di zolfo e particelle, si combinò con la nebbia naturale, formando uno spesso strato di smog che coprì Londra per diversi giorni, dal 5 al 9 dicembre. Secondo alcune stime le vittime di questa catasfrofe ambientale furono 12mila.

Ma questo episodio fu un punto di svolta nella consapevolezza pubblica e governativa riguardo ai pericoli dell'inquinamento atmosferico, portando all’adozione del Clean Air Act nel 1956.

L’inquinamento non si vede, il riscaldamento climatico è troppo lento perché le persone percepiscano l’urgenza dei cambiamenti in atto, si diceva fino a qualche tempo fa parlando di quanto fosse difficile comunicare queste tematiche al grande pubblico. E lo è ancora oggi, anche se l’aria irrrespirabile la sentiamo in gola e nei polmoni, e gli eventi climatici estremi sono sempre più frequenti e purtroppo sotto i nostri occhi.

Ma chi governa le nostre città ha l’obbligo di intervenire prima di essere immersi in un fumo spesso come quello di Londra, o vedere ancora i fiumi straripare e travolgere interi paesi.

Illustration by Shepard Fairey

[axel-draws]

duo of quick charcoal studies done of 1950s London (during the Great Smog) for a class assignment