Talk:2022 United Kingdom heatwaves

Start Date?

Where's the start date from? The warnings first came out on 8 July, but that's not when the actual heat wave started. Greyzxq (talk) 14:43, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Yes, the first warning is when the start date is from. Trying to assign any other kind of start date would be WP:OR, I think. Buttons0603 (talk) 15:06, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Defining it as the dates that those Met Office warnings were in effect for (amber on the 17th, red on the 18th and 19th, down to yellow today) seems reasonable, and more significant than how far in advance they were able to call it. --Lord Belbury (talk) 09:06, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

The Met Office has an objective definition for a UK 'heatwave', see here. It says, "A UK heatwave threshold is met when a location records a period of at least three consecutive days with daily maximum temperatures meeting or exceeding the heatwave temperature threshold". And it explains the thresholds. Note too that they distinguish between heatwaves, extreme temperature warnings, and heat health alerts. -- DeFacto (talk). 09:35, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Article image

Hi. Is there a more appropriate image available? A photo of people sunbathing seems out of place me for many reasons. Here are two: 1. the heat wave is a symptom of global heating, which is not fun, but an existential threat to humanity, 2. it's unhealthy to be sunbathing outside at temperatures around 40 degrees Celsius. Robby.is.on (talk) 21:07, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

If there's any Wikipedia suitable images of the fire damage at Wennington, London (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62217282) or similar I think that would be a better alternative, although I think it would be okay to have both . Eastwood Park and strabane (talk) 21:15, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

I couldn't find any better images, aside from photos of pets this was the only CC-licenced photo showing the UK heatwave in any meaningful fashion on Flickr yesterday. (There are some powerful fire wreckage photos of Brancaster Staithe at https://www.flickr.com/photos/barryslemmings, but someone would need to persuade them to change the licence on a photo.) But I very much agree with the points being made here, I'll remove it. --Lord Belbury (talk) 11:39, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Now replaced with File:Fire at Shirley Hills.jpg from Geograph. --Lord Belbury (talk) 12:55, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 20 July 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved per strong consensus. Closing early, since this is a highly visible article, and the proposal has no chance to gain consensus. This is a non-admin closure. Elijahandskip (talk) 19:33, 23 July 2022 (UTC)

---

(non-admin closure)

2022 United Kingdom heat wave → Effects of the 2022 European heat waves in the United Kingdom – This is part of the European heat wave, and the title makes it seem seperate. Given how it’s an appropriate WP:SPINOFF, we should do the standard title, like what we do for tropical cyclones. 50.247.149.124 (talk) 11:48, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:CONCISE. The current title is enough to identify the topic, and the longer version sounds like it's as much about the knock-on effects for the UK of heat disruption in mainland Europe, which isn't the case. Tornado articles get longer "Effects of..." titles because the name of the hurricane is what a typical reader would know it by, and a shorter 2005 Florida hurricane version would make its subject less obvious. --Lord Belbury (talk) 13:09, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose per reasons above Greyzxq (talk) 13:18, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose I feel that Tornados are a single object with effects where they go at a certain point in time, but a heatwave is a much more "fluffy" concept in both time and location covered. A heatwave covers a lot of area at once, possibly larger than just Europe, and so calling it "UK heat wave", (when the article is relevant to just the UK), would seem more accurate in my opinion hrf (talk) 13:27, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose. Less concise and is not adherent to WP:COMMONNAME. Arcahaeoindris (talk) 17:07, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:CONCISE and per the naming convention of similar articles. This is Paul (talk) 20:48, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
• Support "Fog in Channel- continent cut off". Pure Anglo-centrism. Laurel Lodged (talk) 21:08, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Oppose for reasons above Argenton (talk) 21:53, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per above XxLuckyCxX (talk) 16:28, 21 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose per above Profzed (talk) 10:04, 22 July 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose Fine as it is, a general overview.♦ Dr. Blofeld 20:28, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

@50.247.149.124 oppose for reasons stated above. You can always shove something of this sort into some other, larger category. And this particular record breaking heat wave is remarkable and requires its own space. Andysoh (talk) 21:08, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Some of the 'record temperature' values sourced from the BBC don't match the Met Office data

E.g. The highest minimum is 25.8 at Kenley Airfield, London, rather than 25.9 at Emley Moor: https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press-office/news/weather-and-climate/2022/record-temperatures-2022-a-review Scherben808 (talk) 13:00, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

The Met Office lists the data in that press release as 'provisional'. I would suggest the article is not updated until non-provisional data is available. When such happens, the article should be changed to match Met Office records as they are generally regarded as the more/most authoritative source for recorded UK weather. Best wishes, ~ El D. (talk to me) 09:57, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

Just to note that the BBC no longer uses Met Office weather data, so some difference between the two is to be expected. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 20:50, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

More than one heat wave

Now that shortly we'll have had three separate heat waves in the UK this summer I'm wondering if we should rename this article July 2022 United Kingdom heat wave to make it more specific to the topic discussed. Either that or should we expand it into a more general article, 2022 United Kingdom heat waves, covering all three? This is Paul (talk) 16:55, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

I think it's fine as it is unless the August heat wave is as bad as July's was, which it doesn't seem it will be. The June wave wasn't substantial enough for it's own article and I doubt August will be either, so having them in 2022 European heat waves is sufficient. And as for renaming the article to include July I think is unneccesary as long as it is clarified in the lead. greyzxq ^talk 17:12, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

I think it either needs renaming to cover all the heatwaves mentioned, or everything that happened after 19 July needs to be removed. I tried removing the latter, but it was restored without any real justification. -- DeFacto (talk). 12:51, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Sorry if my restoring wasn't clarified. I restored most of the stuff you removed because it was in the Aftermath section rather than the Timeline section. I think everything in the Aftermath section is between 19 July and the start of August, with the exception of hosepipe bans, disposable barbecues and the drought. I kept these in because they are all still relevant to the July heatwave. greyzxq ^talk 12:55, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

"Aftermath" implies consequences of the 15-19 July heatwave. Do you think the third heatwave was a consequence of that? Do you think supermarkets stopped selling barbeques on 3 August as a consequence of it, or to avoid fires in later heatwaves? Do you think the drought declared on 12 August was because it was warm between 15 & 19 July? If you answer yes to any of those you need to add reliable sources saying that, otherwise it should probably be removed, unless we widen the scope of the article. -- DeFacto (talk). 13:59, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

It seems a bit strange to be writing about one heat wave in the midst of another so I think the time is coming where we need to broaden this article's scope. As for the title of the section, perhaps for now "Subsequent events" may be more appropriate. Apart from the first two paragraphs and the one about weather forecasters being abused by the anti-climate change lot, most of these events aren't direct consequences of the July heat wave. This is Paul (talk) 14:15, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

I've just done that, thanks. I hope that's resolved everything. greyzxq ^talk 14:25, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

We still need to decide on the article title. It needs to be inclusive of all the article content, not just part of it as at present. We are covering more than just the July heatwave and it's consequences now. -- DeFacto (talk). 14:54, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Agreed. Today's drought declaration seems like a good time to think about this. I think we either need to expand this article's scope or have separate articles for each heat wave. I personally favour the former option as separate articles might tend to be a bit repetitive in that they'd include some of the same information. This is Paul (talk) 15:20, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree with that, maybe if we move the article to 2022 United Kingdom heat waves and have sections for each? If both of you agree with that I'll work on it asap. greyzxq ^talk 15:41, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Agreed. This is Paul (talk) 15:48, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Not sure, it's not just heat waves - there is the low rainfall too, which delivered the drought. So I think it needs to include that too. Something like 2021-2022 United Kingdom weather extremes. -- DeFacto (talk). 16:19, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

I think that seems a bit too ambiguous, but i agree with your point. Maybe just 2022 United Kingdom heat waves and drought? Although articles like 1955 United Kingdom heat wave don't include drought in the title and still have it in the lead as one of two main events. greyzxq ^talk 16:24, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Probably better to go with naming convention and have 2022 United Kingdom heat waves, or even 2022 British Isles heat waves as Ireland experienced the same weather. Mentioning the drought in the lede seems to be ok. This is Paul (talk) 17:36, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree with just United Kingdom as Ireland is covered in the main European article, so if it's all ok with you DeFacto I'll move this article to 2022 United Kingdom heat waves. greyzxq ^talk 17:43, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure that that title gives a broad enough scope to include the droughts and wildfires, but won't stand in the way of it for now, given the low interest level in the discussion so far. -- DeFacto (talk). 20:14, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

All done, I've rearranged some of the article but it needs lots of cleaning up and more content now. greyzxq ^talk 20:40, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Attribution

World Weather Attribution has analyzed the heatwave. Result: Without human-caused climate change temperatures of 40°C in the UK would have been extremely unlikely. Should be added. Andol (talk) 22:56, 10 August 2022 (UTC)

An article from The Guardian covers analysis by the World Weather Attribution. WP:Be bold? :-) Robby.is.on (talk) 09:25, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

Done - I cited BBC but feel free to use other cites if better Chidgk1 (talk) 06:39, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Exclusion of certain fires

As this article covers the whole of 2022, and as we cannot say that any of the fires are directly related to either of the two short heatwaves, why would we want to exclude any of the 2020 fires from it? -- DeFacto (talk). 11:41, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

This article isn't about the whole of 2022, it's about July and August, whilst the 2022 European and Mediterranean wildfires article is about all wildfires in 2022. So there is no reason to have fires in April and May here, which is why it stayed in the other article for almost a month until you moved it. greyzxq ^talk 11:53, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

That was never agreed, and not per the article title. -- DeFacto (talk). 11:59, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

The article title says that this is about heat waves, and the only heat waves in the country this year were in July and August, so the section about wildfires should only include fires in July or August. greyzxq ^talk 12:05, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

That was the title we agreed. And as I recall, we also agreed that it was about the fires and drought too, which are not limited to just those two months. If it's just about the two heatwaves, then we'll need other articles to cover the fires and drought. It seems ridiculous to have an article that only covers two months worth of fires and drought simply because they are the only months that contained the few days of the UK heatwaves.

And indeed, the 'Drought' section currently starts The Met Office said rainfall between January and June 2022 was the lowest since 1976. Should we hide that in some other article too? -- DeFacto (talk). 12:38, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Yeah, but including stuff from more than a month before the heatwaves started is just irrelevant, the inclusion of droughts and fires is because they are a result of the heatwave, but a fire which happened in may or april has no relation to the heatwave, and i'm not even sure whether it should be in either article. greyzxq ^talk 12:56, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

The drought is a result of low rainfall since January, not because of a handful of warm days in July and August. There were fires in April, so how do we know the ones in July and later only happened because of the few hot days? We need to be neutral on the causes and let the reader see all the info, and not just limit it to our own personal opinions. -- DeFacto (talk). 13:04, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

There are always wildfires in the UK, the april and may fire was just that, but in the article it says there was a 700% increase in fires during the heatwave, so it's pretty clear that they were because of the heat. Either way, the april and may ones are 100% unrelated to the article's subject, so they shouldn't be included. greyzxq ^talk 13:16, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

I disagree with this artificial reduction in scope, and reliance on an apparent WP:SYNTH conclusion about the link between the warm days and the fires. And you didn't comment on the wider date scope already seen in the 'Drought' section. -- DeFacto (talk). 13:22, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

heatwave vs heat wave

I don't understand why every time it says heat wave or heat waves in this article it gets changed by User:DeFacto to heatwave or heatwaves, when no other article about a heat wave does this, not even any of the ones about previous UK heat waves. This article really shouldn't have been moved to this different title without discussion, especially as every time DeFacto has changed heat wave to heatwave it's been undone by other editors. greyzxq ^talk 11:50, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

It's simply that 'heatwave' is the word used in British English for these events, as will be seen in all but one of the sources used in the article. -- DeFacto (talk). 11:57, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

It might be British English, but by the fact that no other article says heatwave we should stick to them, no matter if the text in the article uses heatwave. greyzxq ^talk 12:05, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

I think Wikipedia tolerates different varieties of English in both article titles and article content, so I do not see a problem. -- DeFacto (talk). 12:43, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

I think that there's no reason for this article to have a different title when every other article about a very similar topic has the same. greyzxq ^talk 12:56, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Per MOS:TIES articles about heat waves in countries where British English is the dominant variant of English should probably be aligned to use the "heatwave" spelling. Robby.is.on (talk) 13:47, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

I think the title should be heat waves rather than heatwaves since that is the naming convention of other articles, such as 1976 British Isles heat wave. Also, as I've mentioned before we should be thinking about whether to name this article geographically rather than by country (i.e., 2022 British Isles heat waves like the numerous other heat wave articles do) because Ireland had similar weather and the two countries are usually dealt with together for the purposes of weather articles. This is Paul (talk) 08:49, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

I'm neutral on the article title. I only changed it because of this edit by InedibleHulk, in which they justified spelling changes as aligning with the article title, and seemed to favour an article rename.

I agree that heatwaves are geographical, and do not align with political boundaries, so would support 'British Isles' rather than 'UK'.

I also believe that we need to formally broaden the scope to include droughts and grass fires/wildfires to avoid the ridiculous situation we have now where fires are only included if they happened in July, or later, and earlier ones are documented in the 2022 European and Mediterranean wildfires article! The excuse for that is apparently based on the current article title and that any fires before the first heatwave cannot be included because they cannot be related to the heatwaves. -- DeFacto (talk). 09:53, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

Definitely agree we should broaden this article's scope. I still don't get why we're not including the June heat wave. I know it was relatively minor and short lived in comparison to what happened later in the year, but it was a contributing factor to the drought, the wildfires, etc. I do vaguely remember three or four heat waves being forecast at the beginning of the summer so including that information would make for a more complete article. This is Paul (talk) 08:55, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

I've inserted a mention of the June one so we don't forget it. -- DeFacto (talk). 08:43, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

As long as there's internal consistency, I'm OK with either spelling regardless of other articles' choices. By the way, I'm a "he", not a "they". Nobody's obliged to remember that, though, especially when it's not ambiguous. And as long as the title refers to a heat wave or heat waves directly, by any synonym, count me out on including events occuring during or resulting from ordinary summer heat. If every span of days becomes a heatwave, the very distinction loses its whole raison d'etre. InedibleHulk (talk) 21:35, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree on the ordinary summer heat thing. I mentioned the June heat wave though because 2022 European heat waves includes it, and it may serve as some background information for this article. There's also a hatnote to its mention in 2022 European heat waves, which just seems a bit odd to me. They're surely all part of the same build up to what was basically an extremely hot summer that resulted in a drought, hosepipe bans, etc, so why not just include them all. This is Paul (talk) 23:12, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

If including everything weatherly under the sun, from June through August, 2022 United Kingdom summer makes more sense to me. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:50, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

2022 British Isles heatwaves

I propose changing the title to '2022 British Isles heatwaves' in line with previous articles. TGcoa (talk) 21:53, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

• Agree but think it should be heat waves rather than heatwaves. This is Paul (talk) 08:50, 17 August 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose: Including Ireland in this article would just make it even more confusing and make the article huge, and article's titles for previous heatwave in the UK change from British Isles to United Kingdom. greyzxq ^talk 12:21, 17 August 2022 (UTC)
• Not sure but agree that it does need to be moved to heat wave, as with every other article on heat waves.Arcahaeoindris (talk) 09:43, 19 August 2022 (UTC)
• Comment: I agree that it should be heat waves, but I don't support it being moved to British Isles. greyzxq ^talk 12:36, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Main infobox

DeFacto, how is having an infobox in the lead misleading? greyzxq ^talk 16:31, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

The infobox you chose is for a singular event, it is not designed to hold the information for multiple events. There were three events (so far), "peak temperature" is meaningless as there were three, as is deaths as they were three separate events, etc. There is no point adding it just for the sake of it as is causes confusion and is misleading. -- DeFacto (talk). 17:14, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

You say it causes confusion and is misleading but I don't see how. Furthermore, in the main 2022 European heat waves there is one infobox for all the heatwaves and that works fine. greyzxq ^talk 17:22, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

I explained. It is designed for one thing and being used for another. And whether, or not, it works elsewhere is irrelevant. -- DeFacto (talk). 19:51, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

And you said 'The infobox you chose' but what other infobox would you suggest I use? greyzxq ^talk 17:28, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

I have no idea, I didn't look. But what I do know, is this one is not made for multiple disparate events. -- DeFacto (talk). 19:54, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

Anyone like to update Climate change in the United Kingdom?

I see a lot of editors are doing great work on this article. As having the same wikilink in the body and lead is allowed I just linked Climate change in the United Kingdom from the lead.

However that article is rather out of date so I wonder if any of you would like to improve it. Chidgk1 (talk) 06:29, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for asking this. I've been gradually trying to improve that article but more contributors would be great as it needs much work. Arcahaeoindris (talk) 21:17, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

August Heatwave End Date

I am surprised to see the August heat wave is not considered ongoing. While some parts of the country got a bit rain on the suggested August 15th end date this was by no means true of the entire country. In the South East for example rain was light or non-existent and temperatures have remained high. Indeed temperatures have remained constant all month and I cannot see why the 15th is marked out as a day unlike any other during the month or why it is considered the end when temperatures remain elevated. 2A02:6B6F:5418:0:CDB0:F822:AB02:75EE (talk) 21:21, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

Definitions of 'heat wave' and 'extreme temperatures'

Should pages such as this not provide the criteria used for a heat wave (e.g., 3 days above some temperature) and for extreme temperatures given that these terms are central to the topic and not used in a uniform way across the globe? Kmarkus (talk) 15:46, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Death figures wrong

The ONS has published figures for excess deaths of over 65s and for England and Wales estimate 3271 - so 3200 from the Mirror cannot be correct. It does not include Northern Ireland, nor Scotland (typically 4% above normal) and does not include that excess is only excess over the average of the previous 10-15 years and not the actual rate of a normal climate - so there is an elevated or excess since 1974 due to excess heat. Lastly it does not include people in their 50s and early 60s - many of which are also vulnerable. 88.112.31.26 (talk) 19:43, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

The death figures for all three heatwaves have been problematic because no source explicitly says that a certain amount of deaths were caused by heat, not even the reports published by the ONS, unless I missed something. Look at this report from the ONS to see if you can find anything that clearly says a figure for deaths caused by heat. greyzxq ^talk 19:55, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:July 1757 heat wave which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 09:21, 10 August 2023 (UTC)