Traffic lights could solve safety issue

Well, yes it is!, but these, the wobbling earth’s axis and the reversing polarity of the magnetic poles are natural changes which can happen within decades, rather than centuries.

There have been at least three major glacial ice ages and three major thaws, the last allegedly after man discovered fire to barbecue his juicy mammoth-burgers, with hundreds of inter-glacial climatic hiccups in between! If earth was formed on January 1, mankind appears at 11.45pm, 31st December!

In the 1970s, scientists and politicians enthusiastically concurred we were on the verge of a devastating new ice age (see below), but are our climate and weather patterns really any different today from 50 or 100 years ago? No, not really! If anyone disbelieves me, they have only to analyse the daily weather records in the annual ‘Whitakers Almanacks’, since the late 1800s. Seek, and you will find the truth - if you are that interested!

Take June 21. Seven random samples between 1911-1952 gives an average temperature of 59.9oF with a 80.9oF high in 1938 (it was actually 87.8oF on June 21 1936 and 1937). Average rainfall 0.03” due to one 0.15” shower in 1952! The sun shone on average for 7.7 hours.

That for 1958-2008 shows an average temperature of 59.1oF, a 71.2oF high (1984), 0.07” of rain thanks to a 0.44” monsoon in 1990; the sun shone for 4.4 hours! Official average June temperatures are: 1841-1905 60.3oF; 1906-1935 59.1oF; 1921-1950 60.3oF, 1951-1980 57.7oF, 1961-1990 57.0oF and 2004, 58.8oF.

And for 21st June 2011? A barely average 57.9oF! When I was at school in Rye 50 years ago, when the Salts flooded, today’s 57.9oF was considered colder than the pre-war 60.3oF or 59.1oF! But then I was educated in maths and science before Mr Blair’s ‘Education cubed, politically correct socio-economic Stern and IGPCC man-made global warming reports’.

In today’s ‘enlightened’ times, ‘Whitakers Almanack’ no longer records useful weather statistics for critical analysis - I wonder why?

Barry M Jones

Bixley Lane, Beckley.