I know, a bit late on this one, but “I’ve been busy” ;-)
In addition to a frozen UK, we’ve had a very frozen Germany.
http://iceagenow.info/2013/03/we%E2%80%99ve-coldest-march-1883-germany-reader/
We’ve got the COLDEST MARCH SINCE 1883 in Germany! says reader
By Robert On March 27, 2013It’s official: this March in northeastern Germany is the coldest in 130 years, and could be the coldest since records began.
Not just one day, mind you. We’re talking about the entire month.
In Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg and Berlin, the DWD average temperatures measured up to almost minus two degrees, very close to the previous March-cold record of 1883.
130 Years.
So, where did all that loverly Global Warming go?
We were promised that it would be warm. Seems to me somebody could get sued over breach of promise…
Kältester März seit 1883 – und es bleibt frostig
So, jetzt ist es amtlich: Dieser März ist im Nordosten der kälteste seit 130 Jahren, er könnte sogar der kälteste seit Beginn der Wetteraufzeichnungen werden. Auch Ostern wird frostig.
Ostereiersuchen im Freien – dafür sind diesmal Mantel, Stiefel, Mütze und Schal angesagt. Blühende Sträucher, bunte Blumen, frisches Grün – Fehlanzeige. Hartnäckig hält sich die Kälte in Deutschland – von null Grad im Nordosten bis zehn Grad im Süden reicht die Palette während der Ostertage.
“Hoch ‘Jill’ über Südskandinavien lässt einfach nicht locker und schickt uns weiterhin permanent kalte Luft aus russischen oder polaren Gefilden”, sagte Meteorologe Simon Trippler vom Deutschen Wetterdienst (DWD) in Offenbach. Ein Frühlingsdurchbruch ist nicht in Sicht.
Auch Tief “Dieter”, das bis Samstag Deutschland von West nach Ost überquert, werde es nicht wärmer machen, sondern Regen und Schnee bringen. Und danach dominiere wieder die Ostströmung: “Das garantiert die Fortdauer der zu kalten Witterung bis über Ostern hinaus”, sagt Trippler trocken.
Im Nordosten Deutschlands geht der kälteste März seit mindestens 130 Jahren zu Ende. Für Sachsen-Anhalt, Brandenburg und Berlin ermittelte der DWD Durchschnittstemperaturen bis zu knapp minus zwei Grad, die ganz dicht am bisherigen März-Kälterekord aus dem Jahr 1883 liegen. In den letzten vier Tagen des Monats entscheidet sich, ob es dort sogar einen Rekord gibt. Es wäre dann der kälteste März seit Beginn der Wetteraufzeichnungen 1881.
A Google Translate of it, just because I’m feeling lazy ;-)
Coldest March since 1883 – and it remains frosty
So now it’s official: this is March in the northeast of the coldest for 130 years, he could even be the coldest since records began. Easter is also frosty.
Easter egg hunts in the open – but this time are coat, boots, hat and scarf announced. Flowering shrubs, colorful flowers, fresh greenery – None. Stubbornly keeps the cold in Germany – from zero degrees to the northeast to ten degrees in the south they range during Easter.
‘High’ Jill ‘over southern Scandinavia can not simply loose and sends us continue permanently cold air from Russia or polar climes, “said meteorologist Simon Trippler the German Weather Service (DWD) in Offenbach. Spring is a breakthrough in sight.
Too deep “Dieter”, which crosses through Saturday from West to East Germany, will not make it warmer, but bring rain and snow. And then again dominate the Ostströmung: “This guarantees the continuance of up to cold weather over Easter to come,” says Trippler dry.
In northeastern Germany, March is the coldest since at least 130 years ago. In Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg and Berlin, the DWD average temperatures measured up to almost minus two degrees, which lie very close to the previous March-cold record from 1883. In the last four days of the month will determine whether there is even a record. It would then be the coldest March since records began 1881st
With some nice pictures too…
White Easter: Germany Faces Coldest March Since 1883
Complaining about the weather has reached epidemic proportions in northern Germany this “spring.” And with good reason. With Easter just around the corner, meteorologists are telling us this could end up being the coldest March in Berlin and its surroundings since records began in the 1880s.
The poor Easter Bunny deserves our sympathy. Whereas in recent years he has grown used to dodging daffodils, lilies and tulips as he carries his cargo of eggs and chocolate to homes across northern Europe, this year the rabbit will find himself confronted with ice slicks, snow drifts and bundled up humans in foul moods.
Easter, after all, may be upon us. But spring weather most definitely is not. Biologists are warning that the Easter Bunny’s wild brethren, European hares, are having trouble keeping their broods warm and healthy in the unseasonable chill. Meteorologists are keeping close tabs on thermometers to determine whether this March will go down as the coldest ever — since records began in the 1880s. And wiseacres on the streets of Berlin have not yet tired of noting that Easter promises to be colder than last Christmas.
And it’s not just the northern regions of Continental Europe where the Easter Bunny will encounter problems. Great Britain and Ireland are likewise suffering through unseasonable weather, with power outages threatening the roast lamb and snow drifts making hopping difficult. Russia and Ukraine are also suffering.
In northern Germany, the weather has been particularly notable for its persistent putrescence. Following a winter that broke all records for its lack of sunshine — with just 91.2 hours of sunshine, total, from the beginning of December to the end of February — the sun has in recent days emerged from behind the haze.
Of all the “cold reports”, I find that 91.2 hours of sun the most disturbing. It’s hard to grow things without sun. I dearly hope that Germany starts getting more sun as Summer comes.
Musings from the Chiefio 
Easter was a bit too early this year. Or maybe spring a bit late. No I’m sure Easter was early, sometimes that happens. In ancient times Easter was in the early spring when new growth started, generally April sometime. Them Romans always screwed things up with their messing with the calendar. No connection to natural things. ;-) pg
If you study the Vostok ice core readout graphs for the last 450,000 years of Earth weather you will see that we are 45,000 years overdue for another ice age! A very steep decline in our atmospheric temperature. During one of these epochs we were totally covered in ice to a depth of one to five miles all the way to Panama! I want to see James Hansen under one of those glaciers!
See The Two Minute Conservative at: http://tinyurl.com/7jgh7wv and when you speak ladies will swoon and liberal gentlemen will weep.
IF the warming of the past few decades was a prelude to a sudden drop in temperature for the Northern Hemisphere, then it’s going to get very interesting very quickly. I continue to read with interest, as you explore options for both near term and long term self reliance. Your explorations and insights are interesting… and may end up being even more so.
I read somewhere that the migrating birds came to Germany this spring and turned around and left again!!!
“Of all the “cold reports”, I find that 91.2 hours of sun the most disturbing. It’s hard to grow things without sun.”
It also makes it more difficult for our solar panel owners to extract more money from us; so that’s an upside – maybe it’s an overall economic benefit; as we can replace own produce with imports. And a diminished harvest means less subsidies to be paid to the biofuel producers and the biogas plant operators.
Maybe our market is so rigged already that less sun is becoming economically beneficial to the average person. Does this count as unintended consequence? Destruction is the goal of the Green, as human activity is to be curbed; he has successfully destroyed, so I guess it is intended.
” I dearly hope that Germany starts getting more sun as Summer comes.”
To no avail. It stays dim in the North as in the South. The last heaps of snow are only now slowly melting in Lower saxony.
It’ll pass. Times change, weather changes, weather patterns change, climate changes. Nothing 7 billion ants can do about it, but suffer the consequences. The upside is indeed that the ‘energiewende’ is doomed. Pity about the capital destruction though.
This must be a real shock to these guys. After my experience with a 1968 BMW 1600, I surmised that the guys who had gone to Russia in the ’40s to learn about cold either hadn’t remembered it or didn’t work at BMW . There is another, less pleasant possibility, but it was a long time ago so i won’t go into that.
It had a flow-through (ONLY) heating-vent system. The car could not be driven above 60 mph when the temperature was less than 20F without the windshield frosting up. Cardboard in front of part of the radiator was the answer.
Of course the real solution was to trade it in on a 2002 in which you could go 80 before running into the same problem.
j ferguson says:
6 April 2013 at 11:20 am
“Of course the real solution was to trade it in on a 2002 in which you could go 80 before running into the same problem.”
Or go for a Volkswagen which doesn’t have that problem either. I think they tested some in Russia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%BCbelwagen
Hah, DirkH!
My experience with VW’s commencing with the ’57 was first that it would not do 80, so there was no issue there, and second, that it would not defrost much more than the lower corners of the windshield if the temperature was much below 20F. In the ’70s I worked with a gentleman who had driven Heinkel 111s in Russia during the ’40s – as a sort of uninvited guest of the Russians. During the cold times, they had found it necessary to keep them running all the time since the donkeys (mechanical ones) intended to heat them up so that they could be started couldn’t themselves be started it if was colder than -20F – which it was. Maybe it would have been better to leave the donkeys running.
I must say that when we figured out what the heating problem with the BMW 1600 actually was we were astonished that it never got cold enough in Germany for them to have discovered it. ??
Here, in the afternoon, near Narbonne in the South of France, within 10 miles of the Mediterranean Sea the temperature is 5.5°C. This is beyond doubt the latest spring that I have experienced here.
We are probably headed into a bad cold spell. The geologic records show abrupt temperature changes (withing a decade) especially in the transition zone between the bi-stable warm/cold states. SEE http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/05/on-“trap-speed-acc-and-the-snr/
So far we humans have been darn lucky because the Holocene has not had the typical wide weather swings.
As far as I can see is the only question is whether or not we will stay in the unstable zone or just flip into an Ice Age. Both or pretty much Lose-Lose especially with the idiotic sociopaths we have as our ‘Leaders’
Gail Combs: “idiotic sociopaths” Hear, Hear.
E.M.S.
I thought Akasofu nailed it some years ago. http://people.iarc.uaf.edu/~sakasofu/pdf/two_natural_components_recent_climate_change.pdf
Worth a look if you haven’t seen it already.
j ferguson says:
6 April 2013 at 12:53 pm
“I must say that when we figured out what the heating problem with the BMW 1600 actually was we were astonished that it never got cold enough in Germany for them to have discovered it. ??”
I have no experience with BMW, but Northern Germany reaches -20 deg C in winter, the South -35 deg C – depending on microclimate and elevation and whether you’re in a valley or have frequent inversions…
In F that’s -4 F and -31 F respectively so I’m astonished they should have a problem at 20 F.
Of course this heating issue in the 68 BMWs was in 68, when it wasn’t nearly as easy as it is today to get an opinion on what the locals did about it. There was no heat on those cars except via flow-through – no recirculation flap. There were a couple of other issues related to corrosion protection (no paint of any kind in parts of the body which could be exposed to salt on the roads – within the front fenders) but they were truly wonderful to drive – the suspensions were sensitive and effective – no matter what you drove over, it always felt like the suspension was saying to itself, “Ach, I know what to do here, these are cobbles.” not like GM cars of the day which said “OMG, what is this. I know. I’ll rumble up and down and the master will think I’m handling it.”
I keep wondering if these atmospheric changes, which are sun mediated, are moving the jet stream about. Not very much research has been done to find out, just the usual nonsense about climate tipping points etc. IMO this should be thoroughly investigated before useless hypothesizing based on such small amounts of data. Surely it’s a major discovery and deserves better.
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/AGU-SABER.html
and
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/15jul_thermosphere/
I read somewhere, forget where, people driving electric cars do so with oilheaters in them so they can keep warm and still have some range left. Makes sense so i guess it’s true.
A WUWT commenter, I think his nick is kwik, said that his fellow Norwegians do that.
You have a better memory than me DirkH, but i have an excuse. I’m very old :)
“der kälteste seit 130 Jahren” ….Oh!, das ist gut!, as one german is one german, two germans are two germans….but three are an army :-)
@Petrossa: I just have a keen interest in assorted European madnesses.
British aren’t going to give any ground to our German friends
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/CET-March.htm
speaking of German friends, this is a not politically correct, I hope they would like it, maybe not a lot
ah, another lost to the world of Fawlty Towers. IMHO that particular episode was a little below par.
@Vukcevic: What a disgusting graph!, it seems that the Met office supercomputer could not compute more faked data anymore and suddenly stopped!
@Vukcevic: Seriously…,and just for your friends, tell us, as you have taught us the relation between temperatures and the GMF. Is this changing too fast?
tckev says:
6 April 2013 at 3:24 pm
I keep wondering if these atmospheric changes, which are sun mediated, are moving the jet stream about….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
From what I can tell it is the sun, ozone layer and perhaps the geomagnetic field.
tutorial: Jet streams and Rossby waves
A comment over at WUWT indicates the speed of the north pole’s movement has accelerated.
Graph solar radiation.
Graph solar radiation at various ocean depths
Different wavelength of sunlight penetrate to different depths of the ocean. Changes in the composition of incoming sunlight could effect SST and evaporation. (see Bob Tisdales videos link for an explanation of ENSO and trade winds.
WUWT discussion: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/01/09/nasa-on-the-sun-tiny-variations-can-have-a-significant-effect-on-terrestrial-climate/#comment-1193881
Solar Activity and Regional Streamflow “Comparison of the 36-month moving average of the Mississippi River streamflow and the Geomagnetic Index AA. Streamflow has been lagged 34 years after the Geomagnetic data.(Perry, 2007)”
There is a state of panic among the proponents and the corrupt circis in charge of the “Energiewende”. This was a bad winter for wind and solar and now they are wondering what next.
This winter certainly forced the the happy green hookers to get real and many Germans who invested heavily in solar installations based on irrational minimum/maximum scenario’s to get really mad when they recieved their electricity bill. They are well below 20% of the minimum scenario for solar. Don’t you love it?
Ron, you produce only a quarter in winter anyway; shorter days, lower sun. If it stays as cloudy as it’s now through summer, now that would REALLY wreck their profitability.
R. de Haan says:
6 April 2013 at 10:25 pm
There is a state of panic among the proponents and the corrupt circis….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Mother Nature must be laughing her head off. link
@DirkH & R. de Haan:
Hmmmm…. interesting cloudy metric, that solar output… Hard to hide it, now that it’s in the power bills ;-)
Anyone know of any records of “cloudy day %” from about 1950-60? Or even during the Dalton. IF we can show a clouds cycle of about 60 years (or 180) and then this summer is undeniably cloudy… Well, that would be nice…
@J. Ferguson:
The Germans have never been all that great at heaters and A/C. Don’t know why. Even my Mercedes is a bit, um, “heater & A/C challenged”. The ’84 wagon in Phoenix in August was, er, nearly abandoned for a rental. (Then again, that was the year the tarmac at the airport melted and they shut down the airport ;-) 126 F in the shade? And there ain’t no shade…
We went back to the hotel and hit the pool… and decided that driving around Phoenix in August was best not done at 2 in the afternoon….
@Gordon Walker:
What is the usual temp? That sound low to me, but I don’t have a comparison point.
@Gail:
As I detailed in an earlier posting, there is a “stable warm” zone at max of the Milankovich cycle, then it goes unstable (to ocean currents) when away from the peak N. insolation. So since we are now well away from “max”, we are entering the unstable zone.
The “good new”, from my perspective, is that then the heat backs up in Florida and the American South East… so we get warm while Europe ices over…
(So all you folks in England and Germany: Get yourself a small condo in Florida now. Rent it out to tourists during summers and then head over here “to inspect your property” in winter ;-)
@Tckev:
It’s the UV that makes the changes happen. Look at the differential absorption. (I’m pondering a posting…) That’s the solar cycle.
A separate orbital cycle (Millankovich) causes the very long thousands of years changes of stability points. Then a millions years scale drift of continents changes long term things like if Ice Ages can happen at all.
Then there are the lunar cycles of 9 to 1800 years… that are VERY important…
Mix, stir.
Don’t know exactly how to integrate what Vukcevic has done with EMF. It’s on some kind of cycle, but don’t know which is cause and which effect. On my “someday” is to look for correlations with lunar / solar patterns.
@Vuk:
I rather like that particular F.T. skit ;-)
@Petrossa:
Part of the “dirty little secret” of electric cars. That all that “waste heat” from gas engines isn’t all that wasted for most of the year in many places. Heck, even my Diesel is challenged with “not enough ‘waste’ heat” in the very cold. Also running an A/C in traffic in Phoenix in August is going to “interesting” for some folks ;-) IIRC, it’s about 5 hp just for a good A/C… and it runs constantly there…
In places with “extreme climate” a lot of folks are going to discover that they are now paying for heat and A/C at mains electric rates…
FWIW, there was a VW back in the ’80s that had an added fuel driven heater in it. I think it was a Diesel, but I’m not sure. At any rate, it’s a known problem of too efficient an engine in very cold places…
The usual temperature here in Midi is about 13 to 18°C at this time of the year but this spring has been mainly much colder than normal. Based upon my experience over the last 20 years here, both spring and autumn have cooled since the end of the nineties.
Gail Combs says:
6 April 2013 at 10:03 pm
……
Hi Ms Combs
About some misconceptions regarding the Northern Hemisphere’s magnetic pole.
– There are two centres of magnetic intensity, one to the west of Hudson Bay and the other in the central Siberia.
These locations have been more or less stationary since 1600’s (based on the compass historic data). What has changed is their relative intensity.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AT-GMF.gif (note reversed scale)
The Hudson Bay’s leg has been loosing while the Siberian gaining the strength.
See also http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/geomag/data/mag_maps/pdf/F_map_mf_2010.pdf
– To add further to the confusion there is large difference in what a compass dip-needle or a magnetograph see on the surface (red dots) and what solar wind or geomagnetic storms see (blue dots)
the aurora oval http://helios.swpc.noaa.gov/ovation/images/Ovation_USA.png
is cantered on location of blue dots.
If climate is influenced by geomagnetic field action on cosmic rays (Svensmark etc) or similar, then there was no appreciable movement of the N. pole since 1900 (blue dots link).
If the magnetic field change effect is on the ocean currents than average of two fields on the surface is the factor, than the area of strongest field in the Arctic Ocean is in the area of Beaufort Gyre (the Arctic’s circulation flywheel, see the first link) which is little to do with ‘conventional’ position of the magnetic north pole (red dots link).
Finally and most likely is that the changes in magnetic field are reflected in the tectonic activity which is modulating the warm/cold currents balance in the critical areas, such as Denmark Strait and Reykjanes ridge , driving the subpolar gyre (home of the AMO) the engine of heat transfer in the N. Atlantic.
Thanks, Vukcevic for straightening that out.. When it comes to Geomagnitism, I know you have done a lot of research in the area.
William Astley comments are here:
original: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/05/warming-and-worry-go-awol/#comment-1266608
response to Dr Norman Page’s question: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/02/global-cooling-methods-and-testable-decadal-predictions/#comment-1264726
….the Younger Dryas burn marks: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/02/global-cooling-methods-and-testable-decadal-predictions/#comment-1265422
….I have significantly more material … http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/02/global-cooling-methods-and-testable-decadal-predictions/#comment-1265534
more: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/02/global-cooling-methods-and-testable-decadal-predictions/#comment-1265745
You made one comment upthread (I like your graph) but didn’t challenge Astley later so I wasn’t sure what to think. Now you have saved me a lot of time hunting down a myth.
YIKES!
This from WUWT – marcvsbarcvs says:
It is getting bad when a 26 year old dies from hypothermia in April indoors.
Gail Combs says:
You made one comment upthread (I like your graph) but didn’t challenge Astley later so I wasn’t sure what to think.
Hi again
I usually get into a tangle with the Stanford’s Solar Sage, that is enough excitement, but more importantly often there is something new to learn from it.
E.M.Smith says:
7 April 2013 at 12:07 am
“Anyone know of any records of “cloudy day %” from about 1950-60? ”
I only have links for the satellite era; but they’re interesting enough.
This page has a chart back to 1983. And links.
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2006/01/11/jumping-to-conclusions-frogs-global-warming-and-nature/
Again, back to 1983
Gail Combs,
From time to time, at Bishop’s, a reference is made to additional-death rate in England due to cost of heating – usually the elderly. The most recent number was 2,000/month. I’ve asked there more than twice about whether this number is thought reliable by the readers who might know, if it is, is doing anything about it contemplated, and if not is there any effective outrage over it. No-one ever takes on this issue in the sense of sharing thoughts on why there seems no outrage. I’m dumbfounded.
The discussion is generally that these early deaths can be assigned to government policy and its upward influence on energy costs via stupid programs.
Maybe the number is bogus, or maybe no-one cares how pensioners depart this life or when.
This week, the Telegraph contained an article on the deaths, but little sense of whether they are an “issue.”
It could be that a lot of the departures are people who have accurately gauged the social and political environment of the next twenty or thirty years and simply don’t want to be here for it.
but why no outrage?
vukcevic,
Thank you for showing me some new stuff that I didn’t know.
@J Ferguson:
People have an emotional response to individual deaths of those that they know.
People do not have an emotional response to a statistic.
So some %/year dying from lung cancer from smoking? No outrage.
Some %/year dying in car accidents? No outrage.
How many young men/year dying in battles in foreign lands? No outrage.
Add to that a long tradition of being “stoic” about things, well,… There have been a few hundred years of folks “putting up with” various problems and stupidities there. So how many died in W.W.I battlefields in France alone? How many in air raids in W.W.II? (My mother was part of a team of children that threw sand bags on fire bombs. She was about 15 or 16 years old. Then a few got blown up as a ‘delay then explode’ feature was added, so they had to count to 10 or so before running up to throw sand bags on a firebomb…) Folks will talk about things with each other, and often (politely) express some opinion or dismay, but outrage is just not British… At least, not the “Old School” British that was Mum…
That “Quiet Burn” aspect of the British character regularly misleads other folks in the world. It gets mistaken for “I am weak”, or “I don’t care”, or even “I am dumb”. What it usually has meant is “I am planning your demise”. So I’m hoping the Britain of old has not faded away, and that the same “Slow burn” character is still at work; planning the demise of a few selected political idiots.
(I fear that the Britain of old packed up and left for the USA, Australia, Canada, etc. etc. and the ones that stayed behind were the ones less “independent” minded…
At any rate, the whole “Put on an emotional display” thing is just not a good way to measure the British attitude.
@ChiefIO:
“That “Quiet Burn” aspect of the British character regularly misleads other folks in the world. It gets mistaken for “I am weak”, or “I don’t care”, or even “I am dumb”. What it usually has meant is “I am planning your demise”. So I’m hoping the Britain of old has not faded away, and that the same “Slow burn” character is still at work; planning the demise of a few selected political idiots.”
If you turn it around that sounds like an almost perfect description of the Fabians. (named after Fabian, “The Delayer”; their goal is to convert societies from within into a socialist utopia, gradualists, literally planning the demise of the previously existing society.) And it is most definitely at work; as they have been founded about 10 years before the Labor party and control the Labor party since its foundation. The London School Of Economics is the predominant breeding ground it seems, with interesting international connections, for instance the kids of Gadafhi, or at least one I know of, went there.
So to me it looks like a lot of the ones that are still in the UK are mostly planning their own demise. But wouldn’t call it a demise.
This is their symbol; the wolf in sheep’s clothing. From their famous tinted glass window.
Makes you wonder whether they use France as a testbed. Only kidding.
vukcevic says:
7 April 2013 at 11:32 am
…. I usually get into a tangle with the Stanford’s Solar Sage, that is enough excitement….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I love your tangles with Stanford’s Solar Sage. He is going to defend the sun is constant even if it goes super nova.
It does not escape my notice that Stanford University is also the home of John Holdren and l R. Ehrlich who made this famous quote.
Now we find CAGW being used as the excuse to de-develop the United States and the EU with The Solar Sage stoutly defending one of the three major pillars of CAGW. Ferdinand Englebeen defends the second pillar, CO2 is a well mixed gas while Steve Mosher defends the last pillar, the temperature record and models. Sure makes you wonder….
E.M.
I suspect i read everything posted at Bishop’s, especially the comments and don’t find any reticence among our brothers and sisters ‘cross the pond to become agitated on other subjects in which most of us have an interest. Maybe, as you say, 2,000 additional deaths is an abstraction, but as this is alleged to result from government policies roundly condemned at that site, one would think the deaths a call to action.
It could also be that interest from the colonies might be thought unseemly – none of my business, perhaps.
I had wondered if the problem was simply “living beyond their means” or had living itself become “beyond their means?”
And no. I don’t think this figure has any similarity to losses via auto-accidents or other mortality incurred in the course of some more or less voluntary activity.
I think that the pensioner hypothermia problem in the UK isn’t going to go away any year soon. Much of the housing stock in the UK cannot be heated satisfactorily or economically throughout winter. So as a result pensioners try to manage their heating, but there are problems with this as this means that temperatures in different rooms can vary and temperatures can vary throughout the day leading to slightly higher stress levels on the body which would not impact a younger person but can put an older person at risk.
On top of that pensioners are much less able than a younger person to tell if they are cold or not, and far less likely to detect if the level of cold might be dangerous. And so an increased death toll is the result. For pensioners able to live in modern well insulated homes where the central heating can keep the entire house at comfortable levels 24 hours a day yet return a manageable bill then the issue of becoming part of the ‘excess UK winter deaths’ does not exist.
Since the UK house building industry has been in a slump for several years now, and as a generalisation the more vulnerable pensioners also live in the oldest housing this problem isn’t going to go away in a hurry. Fracking and reduced gas bills may help, but bills are going up not down, and winter time temperatures are set to plunge, so we can expect to see the pensioner death rate climb still further over the coming years.
Maybe I’m just more willing to do “tacky things”, but were I living in a very cold poorly insulated house, I’d be making “wall hangings” our of wool covers with styrofoam fill in them… and putting “bubble wrap” in the windows.
That, and having an electric blanket close to hand for the very cold times… Heck, as it is I’ll sometimes toss a “holofill’ sleeping bag over the bed or chair when it’s particularly cold.
Like when I was sitting all night on the patio in winter to “explain” to a local cat that my bunnies were not for his amusement… Took the better part of a week of it for him to ‘catch on’ that an Airsoft Pellet could come whooshing out of the dark at him at any time. I had an LED lamp pointed where the “Fence Highway” from down the block came to my yard, and I was seated behind the lamp in the dark He could not see me… For anyone worried “Airsoft” pellets are vey light plastic things about the size of a fat spherical lentil. They are free of any potential to damage, or even hurt. They do ruffle fur, make a “whoosh” as they fly by, and make a ‘tink’ sound when they hit the fence. All ‘disturbing’ to the cat. I likely could have “trained the cat” in one episode with a steel BB at low power, but that has some risk attached.
The point being that I was sitting outdoors in winter at about 40 F and while ti was cold, was managed with a $40 sleeping bag and a good hat.
When I was a kid, I got my own room via Dad building one in the attic. It was unheated and the roof was not insulated. It would often get quite cold (air temps inland where that house was located could hit 26 F often and 19 F once IIRC). Again, a good sleeping bag and a knit sleeping cap were enough. I came to associate the cold with feeling good and thought I just “Like the cold”. Only later realizing that it put me in clean air away from tobacco; that Dad smoked and I was allergic to tobacco smoke…
So while not ideal ( IMHO, 72-76 F is ideal ;-) it is possible to do well in the cold with enough “bundling up”. Though I remember it was a whole lot nicer when I got an electric blanket for one Christmas ;-)
Maybe the UK could start a program of issuing e-blankets to old folks on pensions…
Speaking of the pensioner hypothermia problem and Outrage, my favorite journalist has something to say.
He goes on to talk of the warmists (Richard Tol) deliberately taking his concluding sentence in an essay in The Australian “Deluged with Flannery and covered in Viner” literally when it was obviously a metaphor.
This was the sentence:
As James says “..How do you hang an “industry”, I wonder. How exactly do you put a rope round a dodgy computer model? Or a £13.7 million UEA climate research grant? Or an article in Guardian Environment pages…”
I think those with a guilty conscience are a bit afraid that sentences like that will give some people Ideas especially when their more vocal member are calling for our deaths. With the temperatures set to take a nose dive, given rare species of bats and birds are being chopped by windmills, the landscape is blighted by windmills and solar farms and granny and granpaw are freezing to death I would be a tad bit worried too.
I really do enjoy Delingpole’s biting wit.
As an ‘old folk’ I too have no real problem with the cold. Given the state of our finances we no longer heat the house since it warms enough during the day to keep the pipes from freezing when it heads for 15F at night. We have a couple of space heaters instead. One in the office (smallest room in the house) one in the bedroom to take the chill off (I like 50-55F) and one, rarely used in the kitchen to warm the hands when cooking.
However good insulation is key. I have rented up north ‘Historic’ houses built before the US revolution. Just tacking up plastic over the entire window AND frame and all the doors but one can make a big difference. The bedroom was an unheated attic room and I used an electric blanket with a good sleeping bag over the top (a no-no) when the temperatures headed to under 30 below. The poor electric blanket just wasn’t warm enough otherwise.
The big problem with hypothermia is you do not feel cold just sleepy. And yeah I have been there.
Thanks EM and Gail Combs for your reference etc.
Interesting the winter of 1883 was the last coldest for Germany. Krakatau popped in May 1883, though Willis Eschenbach at WUWT has posted at least a couple threads arguing against any connection between massive volcanic eruptions and colder weather. The other opposite speculation is that periods of quiet sun in some way cause massive volcanic eruptions.
Here in AK, the snow machine turned back on a week or so ago, with dumps of 14″, a record 6″ (for the day) Sunday, and another 6″ yesterday in Anchorage. Looking at possible below zero temps tonight. Looks like breakup, ice off the local lakes and garden planting is going to be about 2 weeks late unless something spectacular happens. But the days are over 14 hours long and the sunlight eventually wins over the snow and ice. Cheers –
@Tckev:
You are most welcome.
@Agimarc:
So I’ve missed my window of opportunity to Drive the Alcan Highway in comfort for another 30 years, eh?
;-)
IMHO, it is all driven by tides and UV. For the volcanoes, the same change of Length Of Day and tides that the moon causes to air and water, results in slopping about of the magma. Wobble a big old blob of magma under a thinning brittle crust, well…
So look at the “lunar tidal” postings and the way lunar tides change the oceans over various cycles of 1800 years, 179 years, 60 years, etc. Then look at volcanic cycles. Then ask yourself:
We know there are tides in the water, air, and crust. Ought there not be tide in the magma? And what would that do to volcanoes?