LONDON HEAT

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 355, 17 October 1932, Page 7

LONDON HEAT

, swelting heat , HOTTEST DAY REGISTERED FOR TWENTY-ONE YEARS EXTRAORDINARY SCENES Following the hottest day for 21 years, hundreds of Londoners slept outdoors on the night of August 19 — on balconies, in gardens and in some cases on the flat roofs of their houses. At 3 p.m. the tefifperature at ;■ Greenwich Observatory was 99 in j the shade — the highest reading since August 1911, when 100 degrees was | registered. At midnight the tempera- i ture was 84. There is no ofiicial re- j eord of this figure ever being exceeded. j The highest figure recorded in Cen- ■ tral London was 95 degrees, at 3 p.m. | On two other occasions — 1861 and ! 1881 — 95 degu-ees was also registered ; in London. The intense night heat was respon- p sible for remarkabl ; scenes at the ! open air swimming pool in Barking ■ Parlc, where bathing is now permitted ! until midnight and the pool floodnighted by electricity. The night's attendance was estimated at 10,000, j As there was a long queue still waiting at 10.30 it was decided to close the park gates, but it was nearly midnight before those who were waiting to ob'tain admission to the pool were turned away. There were 10,000 bathers in the Serpentine atr one period of the day j and thousands flocked to every public | bathing enclosure all over the country • Enough ice cream bricks to build a j row of 17 six-roomed houses were j sold by one of the great catering I firms of London. A stout man stripped to the Waist, j and an elderly woman wearing just ! the suggestion of a froclc, were seen ( sitting im a large saloon car heside | the Serpentine eating a pound of ice cream. Dozens of young women in 1 bathing costumes sunned themselves in deck chairs on the roofs of the porticoes of Bayswater. A man sat at a horse-watering trough near the Royal Exehange in the City offering "special" drinlcs to horses. He had a large bag of oatmeal and a poster "Free Oatmeal Drinks for Thirsty Horses." There was no relief even up in the air. At 2000ft. pilots at Lympne, wearing only shirts and shorts, reported that they found no change in the temperature at that height. Air liner pilots fiew Very high endeavouring to get some respite for their passengers an'd themselves. Among the happy few who were cool were performers at the B.B.C. headquarters, where the studios are lcept at the same temperature all the year round. An ice factory employee too, was cool. He wore thick woolen ear pads to prevent frost-bite! A middle-aged man walked down Oxford Street wearing a heavy overcoat and a bowler hat. He was one of the sensations of the day. A coroner's Court at Lambeth was adjourned for 15 minutes in order that those engaged there might "cool down." Fourteen deaths attributed to the heat were reported. The intensity of the wave was also partly responsible for the suicide of three men.