StirlingCrispin : Relive your youthful night terrors:

Yep……still gives me the Heebie jeebies.

My primary was by a railway track. We were forever being told if the dangers. Then the police came and told us that we had to stay away as detonators had been found on the track, even showed us pictures so we’d know to stay away. Must have been 100 kids on the tracks at lunchtime, with a half dozen staff trying to herd us off.

Those detonators were great! We had a box of them. I remember a summer spent placing them on a big stone in the river then throwing bricks at them from atop a bridge. Instant soaking. Plus they had little lead legs so you could attach them to things and pick them off with an air rifle. Ahh childhood…

Regarding those public information films, it’s a shame they’ve gone out of fashion.

I heard that the only way to keep kids, etc off train lines and building sites is to scare them rigid.

We need competitions to reward those who create adverts that are terrifyingly efficacious.

“And this years Silver Shamrock award for daytime horror goes to…”

No, I speculated that the weather forecast may have been wrong, which it often is. In this case it was spot on. I’ll take that my guess was inaccurate

So according to you when a forecast is inaccurate it is “wrong” but when you are inaccurate it doesn’t mean that you were wrong at all. How convenient.

The truth is that you were wrong, both with respect to how hot it would get (ie record breaking) and the non-routine disruption that it would cause.

But you don’t have the good grace to admit it, or even resort to the tactic that probably most would use – avoid talking about it.

And btw you are also wrong about wildfires – there were apparently two in Croydon yesterday, no one expects wildfires to be a routine part of a hot summer’s day in Croydon.

BBC: London Fire Brigade had busiest day since World War Two, says London mayor.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62232654

“Yesterday was the busiest day for the fire service in London since the Second World War.

“Normally we get 350 calls a day, on a busy day we can get up to 500 calls. Yesterday the fire service had more than 2,600 calls a day.”

seems apt…

improving the insulation in our homes would help with both.

Yeah but that would involve admitting that the folk who glued themselves to roads were actually right.

Shouldn’t that dog be in a caravan?

Yeah but that would involve admitting that the folk who glued themselves to roads were actually right.

Oh yeah they can’t be right because they got in the way of cars.

I moved into a recently extended Victorian semi about 6 months ago from a new build flat and due to the extreme difference in temperature (old place stayed at 21 degrees without using the heating, this place certainly does not!) one of my first thoughts was to improve the insulation so had it done a month or so ago. I was pleased with myself for my winter preparations, but even more pertinent now.

Of course I’m fortunate in that I was able to pay for it. Ridiculous that we have things like winter fuel payments but can’t sort ourselves out to help with the cause and not just some of the symptoms.

Yeah but that would involve admitting that the folk who glued themselves to roads were actually right.

They are right. Just a bonkers approach to changing people’s behaviour.

That’s a good point actually… Rather than doing annual winter fuel payments surely it would be cheaper in the long run just to give qualifying people a one off insulation voucher or something at a higher amount obvs. But once it’s done that house is then done.
Or possibly alongside a much reduced winter fuel allowance.

They are right. Just a bonkers approach to changing people’s behaviour.

Their approach simply doesn’t work yet they won’t change it. A bit like the people who they want to change not changing what they are doing…

And btw you are also wrong about wildfires – there were apparently two in Croydon yesterday, no one expects wildfires to be a routine part of a hot summer’s day in Croydon.

He’s wrong but then nobody with any sense would take him seriously, the person to listen to and take seriously is this fireman:

THREAD 1. ‘What the hell just happened?’ – My partner (a 999 Fire Control supervisor) and I both used exactly the same phrase as we got home from work today. The true story of today will not become clear until incidents are debriefed, call and incident numbers are reconciled, and

— Dave Walton (@WYFRSDaveWalton) July 19, 2022

What that Fireman says is profoundly true and needs to be shared widely…

Rather than doing annual winter fuel payments surely it would be cheaper in the long run just to give qualifying people a one off insulation voucher or something

The problem with vouchers is that only some companies sign up to the schemes and these businesses are often not the most reputable and do shit jobs. And they also charge the voucher amount + a premium so the resident ends up paying almost as much as going to a reputable supplier directly and get a shit job into the bargain. I am not saying that is *always* the case but it happens a lot.

Could the responsibility be devolved to local councils who get the funding to employ a team to do the work with much more direct accountability? I know councils aren’t always squeaky-clean but I am sure that, on the whole, they would be a better bet than some bunch of randoms turning up in a 15 yr old Transit to do minimum work for maximum profit?

our local population of about 20 house sparrows have vanished 😕

Has all the local fruit been thrown from the trees?

It’s funny, I can remember a nice, long, hot summer, that followed a particularly dry winter, where reservoirs were dangerously low, heat was causing all sorts of infrastructure issues, there were wildfires all over the place as well. But I don’t recall the sneering, point-scoring attitude then that seems to be prevalent now. The government even had a Minister for Water, the situation was getting so bad, they seemed to be taking the situation seriously, instead of saying things like “in the 70’s, we didn’t need all this”; which, oddly enough, is EXACTLY WHEN IT HAPPENED! 🤬

Denis Howell; 1976.

And within days of Dennis Howell being made Minister of Drought the weather mysteriously changed and Britian experienced torrential rain.

They were proper politicians back then that took their jobs seriously.

No, I speculated that the weather forecast may have been wrong, which it often is. In this case it was spot on. I’ll take that my guess was inaccurate

Lounging around in the sun and drinking beer probably means you’re just not bothering to pay attention.

As my job for the last four years, up until March, involved me spending a ten hour day out of doors, I developed a particularly keen interest in the weather, and the weather apps I use, MeteoGroup’s WeatherProHD and Dark Skies are remarkably accurate, especially when there’s a radar update showing exactly what’s going on on an hour by hour basis.

But it’s always wrong, though, isn’t it. #rollseyes

That tweet from the fireman is a sobering read.

https://blog.metoffice.gov.uk/category/met-office-news/

Thanks for sharing ElShalimo. Interesting to see mention of adaptation at the end. People get hung up on climate change mitigation – of course because we all want to take action. The fact is climate change is happening and it’s awkward, expensive and annoying. We have to adapt.

I heard talk on Radio 4 a month or so back about the need to start adapting more to coastal hazards and couldn’t believe this work hadn’t begun in earnest a long time ago. I worked on a national pilot programme for coastal hazard adaptation nearly 10 years ago and it’s an absolute shit fight due to the sensitivities of land use and landowners. My wife is working with councils now to develop adaptation strategies. It’s another area of life that politics is inevitably going to make a mess off… but there’s a lot to do so we better get a move on.

An interesting point I read in a paper was that a 40deg C temp in the UK had a 1 in a 1000 return period without anthropogenic forcing (man made emissions) but only 1 in a 100 when you add that element to the climatology modelling. This was also based on a slightly out of date base/reference level so the more likely return period is a bit lower than 1 in a 100.

Yeah but that would involve admitting that the folk who glued themselves to roads were actually right.

They are right. Just a bonkers approach to changing people’s behaviour.

I suspect it’s probably entirely counter productive, it pisses off a load of people who then hate / want to spite the protestors by not making any changes etc.

Yet more fire damage, this time in Norfolk:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-norfolk-62234289

Of course I’m fortunate in that I was able to pay for it. Ridiculous that we have things like winter fuel payments but can’t sort ourselves out to help with the cause and not just some of the symptoms.

The problem with vouchers is that only some companies sign up to the schemes and these businesses are often not the most reputable and do shit jobs. And they also charge the voucher amount + a premium so the resident ends up paying almost as much as going to a reputable supplier directly and get a shit job into the bargain. I am not saying that is *always* the case but it happens a lot.

They do, we qualified for cavity wall insulation, it felt a little tenuous but we weren’t going to turn down free stuff.

The criteria was pretty much are you working age and 100% healthy, if not it’s free.

Work was done by one of the big facilities/outsourcing companies council get to do all their housing work. Think it was insta-group. They came in transit van with a big shredder/blower machine and a pallet load of compressed glass/plastic fluff bales.

The only quirk of the system is you couldn’t book via the council, the system was 100% outsourced because that’s how the grants worked. The council can’t insulate your private house, just give you a phone number to call to the company that will do it and claim the voucher on your behalf.

10/10 would recommend it to anyone if you get a flyer through the door offering it.

I suspect it’s probably entirely counter productive, it pisses off a load of people who then hate / want to spite the protestors by not making any changes etc.

I’m not sure, you’d have to be certifiably mad to not insulate your house with energy prices as they are. It used to be ~5 years to pay for cavity wall insulation, well if prices have/will treble before this winter that’s more like 18months.

But then again, this was people voluntarily commuting on the M25 🤷‍♂️

I suspect it’s probably entirely counter productive, it pisses off a load of people who then hate / want to spite the protestors by not making any changes etc.

It might be, who knows, but the alternative of sending a strongly worded letter to The Times wasn’t working so well, and this got the issue in the papers at least.

I suspect it’s probably entirely counter productive, it pisses off a load of people who then hate / want to spite the protestors by not making any changes etc.

Just goes to show how passively accept when smoke from a grass/forest fire blocks a motorway and they have to sit in 40º heat for an hour.

it seems that having peoples homes burn down is the only surefire way of making them take notice of climate change.

I’ve come home from a hotel stay to find out Mrs K has left all the windows closed while I’ve been away and it’s still 27.5 degrees inside our house. 🙁

Keeping the windows and curtains closed on the exposed or south side of your house during the day and then opening them when the temp drops in the evening is probably the best approach.

By the way, with wild fires the embers can travel a very long way so can jump across firebreaks.

They’re very scary.

Any ideas on how to convince my Dad to have their cavity walls insulated. They live in a 1930s semi and my Dad is convinced that if they have the cavity walls insulated the insulation will catch on the wall ties which will then make a bridge between the outer and inner wall causing damp. It’s taken my Mum about 10 years to convince him to get rid of the open coal fire and we’ve been trying to convince him to do the walls for longer than that. Any ideas?

Any ideas?

Glue yourself to his drive until he agrees?

Tell him he’ll be dead a long time before any potential damp issues surface

Any ideas

This seems to suggest it depends… but can usually be done?

https://www.twistfix.co.uk/cavity-insulation-wall-ties

There is a school of thought that cavity insulation can exacerbate the tie corrosion process if it becomes damp or wet. The insulation may become wet through rainwater ingress at vulnerable openings or by driving rain being absorbed through the wall itself. Indeed for this reason, building control does not recommend retrofit cavity insulation where a wall is exposed to driving rain and the cavity is less than 75mm wide.

Got to be at least worth getting the walls surveyed, even if only to check the pointing and wall tie condition, as that can cause damp by itself anyway in in disrepair.

Have to say Tuesday was horrible! I’m a bus/coach cleaner in a yard with no shade. I refused to clean upstairs on double deckers. The official temperature was 39 degrees in Leighton Buzzard, but the thermometer i had in the yard said it was over 50 from lunchtime and peaked at 52. I was so hot i stopped sweating even though i went though over a litre of High5 electrolytes an hour. On Wednesday i went home ill after a couple of hours as i realised i had pretty bad heat exhaustion with a raised temperature of 40 according to a medical grade ear thermometer. If I hadn’t gone home at 3.30 on Tuesday that probably would have progressed to full on heatstroke. Still not feeling great now.

Any ideas on how to convince my Dad to have their cavity walls insulated. They live in a 1930s semi and my Dad is convinced that if they have the cavity walls insulated the insulation will catch on the wall ties which will then make a bridge between the outer and inner wall causing damp. It’s taken my Mum about 10 years to convince him to get rid of the open coal fire and we’ve been trying to convince him to do the walls for longer than that. Any ideas?

We’ve just had ours done earlier this spring, as part of the process they did a survey with a borescope. They did leave some recommendations along the lines of future windows should have trickle vents, etc to replace any breathability lost. The insulation is hydrophobic though so shouldn’t get wet.

Depends where you live though, it’s not recommended for exposed westerly walls.

As mentioned on the other thread, not doing it at the moment is daft. The payback time is <2 years, and he’ll probably qualify to have it done free anyway.