Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Search Challenge (8/5/15): Whither the foggy weather?


If you're like me... 

... you probably think about London as a great metropolitan city--a royal city, a capital, a place of museums, castles, wonderful to visit... and... foggy.  


Yet in all of my visits to London over the past 20 years, I don't think I've ever seen fog there.  Am I just lucky?  Or am I just unlucky, and manage to magically miss all of the atmospherics of the Great City?  

But then I think of all the books I've read about London, including at least one where Sherlock Holmes complains about "... the day had been a dreary one, and a dense, drizzly fog lay low upon the great city..."  

Is the legend of great fogs in London really true?  What about other places?  

When I was young, I lived in south central LA, about 10 miles from the beach.  And in those days, I remember waking up and walking to school in dense fog.  Wonderful if you're walking to elementary school, not so wonderful if you have to drive it it.  (After I was driving, I remember driving v.e.r.y slowly on the freeways late at night as I drove to work. A scary time.)  

This reminiscence about fog makes me wonder this week's Challenge: 

1.  What's the story with the fog in London?  IS London foggy?  Or was it only foggy in literature?  Why does London have this reputation? 

2. As a kid, I lived near Long Beach, California and I remember great fogs.  But I don't see them much anymore when I visit these days.  Have the fogs of my youth (the 1960s) vanished?  Is my memory wrong? Do they still have fog as often as we did when I was a kid?  


Let us know what you discover, and HOW you found out!  


Search on! 


14 comments:

  1. Having visited London many times & Northern Ireland over the past 30+ years I have fond memories of walking at night in fog. When the fog was heavy you could also smell the fires from homes. These fires depending where you were, were either coal or peat fires (aka turf). The common expression Pea Fog is well-known for more than just story books. So for this challenge my first query was [pea fog] (aka pea soup) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pea_soup_fog.

    Depending on the location it took a long time to convert home fires to cleaner fuels. Coal was used commonly in England and in addition Peat was a common fuel. It's quite interesting to see the peat fields in Ireland and how they cut the peat for this purpose. http://www.oldandinteresting.com/peat-fire.aspx I have a strong and wonderful association to turf & coal fires, and those walks in the evening in London or Ireland despite its health hazard.

    With California having some of the strictest regulations regarding clean air it's logical that the amount of fog related to emissions would be reduced.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good day, Dr. Russell, fellow SearchResearchers

    Searched:

    I thought using [Fog days London], then Google suggested [number Fooggy days London]

    A day with fog (defined as a day when visibility is below 1000 metres at 0900 UTC) has only occurred on 19 occasions, and the highest number of foggy days in any month has only been 4. (2011)

    [london fog myth]in Web and in Books

    Pea soup fog. Caused by pollution.

    [London fog] results not related to Challenge.

    [Fog London]
    The great somog of 1952. Updated april 2015.

    [why is london so foggy] Suggested by Google.

    A London Fog

    [fog london site:bbc.co.uk] results that looks interesting.

    [london weather intext:fog database]

    What is fog and types.

    [neblina londinense]
    London Fog: Myth or reality? In spanish.

    Great Smoke. In Spanish

    15 days per year.

    ReplyDelete
  3. btw, like the grey gradient font color title - arty
    spent some time, in a Londonesque fog/grog/smog, looking at this 'London frog'… never mind…
    checked the challenge photo — one place it was used, appropriately foggy:
    London based editorial photographer Ben Cawthra
    Ben Cawthra site - intriguing views
    his twitter picks up some interesting pics too…
    back to the search… kinda
    Westminster Bridge… looking for the 12 bus for grins…
    denser than fog -- on a clear day, on the Thames
    for some fun, try to locate the no.12 bus on the bridge in street view/time… (many times/views to sift)
    no.12, on the left
    one of the new 12s - headed to Oxford Cross

    after bus searching… a ways north of Long Beach/Irvine —
    Adrift - Simon Christen
    the backstory on Adrift

    BBC
    EPA, 1994
    "Maureen Scholes, a nurse at the Royal London Hospital in 1952, says the smog penetrated through clothes, blackening undergarments."
    NPR story with links, 2002
    the view from 1880 - Journal of the Society of Arts - used [fog on the moors cause]
    SERP - used: [types of coal]

    regarding the western coast of Cali…
    used [global warming effect on west coast fog occurrence]

    one study - PNAS: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

    viewingReviewing tunes…♬♪⚇
    I think the Red Hot Chili Peppers cut the fog…
    Californication
    for the UKers

    ReplyDelete
  4. 1. What's the story with the fog in London? IS London foggy? Or was it only foggy in literature? Why does London have this reputation?

    [london pea souper 1952]

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog
    On 4 December 1952, an anticyclone settled over a windless London, causing a temperature inversion with cold, stagnant air trapped under a layer (or "lid") of warm air.[6][7] The resultant fog, mixed with chimney smoke, particulates such as those from vehicle exhausts, and other pollutants such as sulphur dioxide, formed a persistent smog, which blanketed the capital the following day. The presence of tarry particles of soot gave the smog its yellow-black colour, hence the nickname "peasouper".[5] The absence of significant wind prevented its dispersal and allowed an unprecedented accumulation of pollutants.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2243732/Pea-souper-killed-12-000-So-black-screen-cinemas-So-suffocatingly-lethal-ran-coffins-How-Great-Smog-choked-London-6
    Households mostly burned the cheapest coal, which was heavy with dust. In the days before central heating, a fire was the only way to heat the rooms, and was often used to boil water and even cook.
    But the smog was also the result of a lethal climate cocktail produced by coal-fired factories, diesel fumes from lorries and buses, and clouds of pollution drifting across the Channel from continental industrial centres.
    The scale of the pollution was incredible. Every day, 1,000 tonnes of smoke belched from London’s chimneys, emitting 2,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, 140 tonnes of hydrochloric acid and 14 tonnes of fluorine compounds.
    Even more deadly, 800 tonnes of sulphuric acid was formed as sulphur dioxide coming from chimneys mixed with moisture in the air.


    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2243732/Pea-souper-killed-12-000-So-black-screen-cinemas-So-suffocatingly-lethal-ran-coffins-How-Great-Smog-choked-London-60-years-ago-week.html#ixzz3i4e5RjGv


    2. As a kid, I lived near Long Beach, California and I remember great fogs. But I don't see them much anymore when I visit these days. Have the fogs of my youth (the 1960s) vanished? Is my memory wrong? Do they still have fog as often as we did when I was a kid?

    [los angeles days of fog 1970 - 2015]

    http://www.kcet.org/socal/departures/columns/laws-that-shaped-la/how-los-angeles-began-to-put-its-smoggy-days-behind.html

    http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2005/08/02/national/20050803_angeles.html

    http://www.kcet.org/updaily/socal_focus/history/los-angeles-smoggy-past-photos-31321.html

    http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-obama-smog-20150803-htmlstory.html

    So we were looking at Smog. London is neatly explained and LA air was cleaned up by the 1970 Clean Air Act.

    jon tU

    ReplyDelete
  5. — since there is extra search time…
    this kind of wanders into the realm of anglophile, but
    thought it was of interest… while looking up a few pea souper references,
    ran across this early mention (1661) of "Fumifugium, or, The inconveniencie of the aer and smoak of London
    the idea of smog goes back centuries…
    Fumifugium
    (in html form…) html - may be easier to read?
    John Evelyn, FRS

    London photo examples from the more recent past… used [magical fog]
    #22 is relevant to the challenge photo - the snow seems white for 1955…
    more recent

    btw, when you wrote: "When I was young, I lived in south central LA, about 10 miles from the beach." did you mean South Central? ;P

    fwiw…
    a cloudy broth…
    Gutenberg - Pea Soup Fog - see cultural references


    a recent Londonesque example in the U.S.
    Denver brown cloud
    this suggests rail transit made a significant reduction

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As it turns out, yes, I was born and raised in Compton. True.

      Delete
  6. First post vanished. This is what I sent along a couple of days ago.

    1. What's the story with the fog in London? IS London foggy? Or was it only foggy in literature? Why does London have this reputation?

    [london pea souper 1952]

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog
    On 4 December 1952, an anticyclone settled over a windless London, causing a temperature inversion with cold, stagnant air trapped under a layer (or "lid") of warm air.[6][7] The resultant fog, mixed with chimney smoke, particulates such as those from vehicle exhausts, and other pollutants such as sulphur dioxide, formed a persistent smog, which blanketed the capital the following day. The presence of tarry particles of soot gave the smog its yellow-black colour, hence the nickname "peasouper".[5] The absence of significant wind prevented its dispersal and allowed an unprecedented accumulation of pollutants.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2243732/Pea-souper-killed-12-000-So-black-screen-cinemas-So-suffocatingly-lethal-ran-coffins-How-Great-Smog-choked-London-6
    Households mostly burned the cheapest coal, which was heavy with dust. In the days before central heating, a fire was the only way to heat the rooms, and was often used to boil water and even cook.
    But the smog was also the result of a lethal climate cocktail produced by coal-fired factories, diesel fumes from lorries and buses, and clouds of pollution drifting across the Channel from continental industrial centres.
    The scale of the pollution was incredible. Every day, 1,000 tonnes of smoke belched from London’s chimneys, emitting 2,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, 140 tonnes of hydrochloric acid and 14 tonnes of fluorine compounds.
    Even more deadly, 800 tonnes of sulphuric acid was formed as sulphur dioxide coming from chimneys mixed with moisture in the air.


    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2243732/Pea-souper-killed-12-000-So-black-screen-cinemas-So-suffocatingly-lethal-ran-coffins-How-Great-Smog-choked-London-60-years-ago-week.html#ixzz3i4e5RjGv


    2. As a kid, I lived near Long Beach, California and I remember great fogs. But I don't see them much anymore when I visit these days. Have the fogs of my youth (the 1960s) vanished? Is my memory wrong? Do they still have fog as often as we did when I was a kid?

    [los angeles days of fog 1970 - 2015]

    http://www.kcet.org/socal/departures/columns/laws-that-shaped-la/how-los-angeles-began-to-put-its-smoggy-days-behind.html

    http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2005/08/02/national/20050803_angeles.html

    http://www.kcet.org/updaily/socal_focus/history/los-angeles-smoggy-past-photos-31321.html

    http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-obama-smog-20150803-htmlstory.html

    So we were looking at Smog. London is neatly explained and LA air was cleaned up by the 1970 Clean Air Act.

    jon tU

    ReplyDelete
  7. a trilogy of pairings that left me foggy & attempting to date link for context:
    ①*London, Westminster Bridge - January, 1955 and August, 2014
    60 years ago & 1 year ago… ~43 years before Google & 16 years after… little has changed & much has & it's a little spacey.
    a paradox
    (the Great Clock in The Elizabeth Tower is almost showing the same time - ~30 minutes differential…)

    ②competing serps on the same topic…
    Gooing

    ③good thing google wasn't fo****…
    foggles
    foogle

    *audio for the above London visit…
    13 years ago, Greater LA, not much fogging… maybe a frug groove
    X years ago - two Danish brothers, Lars and Jens Eilstrup Rasmussen
    a handy chronology

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hello everyone and sorry for being so absent lately (including not having answered my own challenge two or three weeks ago…). I still love the challenges and the ways regular readers solve them.

    Now just a quick answer because this is the only challenge that took me *seconds* to solve. I happen to know very well a meteorologist and weather researcher, so I just emailed him. It took him less than 30 minutes to write me back, so my guess is that it took him 15 minutes or less. Here's his answer, translated the best I could:

    "Question 1
    The most plausible explanation for the lower prevalence of fog in London is that, by the end of the 50s, houses was heated with the combustion of wood or coal. The carbon particles (soot) released from the chimneys act as condensation nuclei for the formation of fog droplets.

    In the late 50s there was a major investment on other types of heating (I don't know how…) and the fog diminished greatly.

    Question 2
    The fog in LA is formed by advection (ie, horizontal transport) of a hot and humid air mass that meets a coastal area with a colder sea water temperature [upwelling, or resurgence of coastal waters, ie, sea ​​water transport from the depths (cooler) to the surface]. The meeting of the hot, moist air mass with the cold sea surface in the vicinity of the coastal area cools the air mass reaching the dew point, creating liquid water droplets, ie, a cloud. Note: this happens on the west coast of Portugal, and it's the main reason why we have a very rich fishing area and also why the sea water on our beaches is cold.

    In the last 30 years, as a result of climate change, the coastal water is warmer, which can inhibit the steam condensation and result in lower prevalence of fog.

    Browsing at warp speed, I found that there are articles saying that, in the LA area, the fog has decreased in the last 30 years. The mechanism appears to be the increase of urban heat island zone, ie, the increase of surface temperature due to the increase of urbanized areas. The surface of urbanized areas evaporates much less than any surface with vegetation; evaporation cools the surface. When there is no evaporation, the temperature of the air at surface rises."


    I am impressed at the succinctnesss of the explanations.

    ReplyDelete