Defra: Air Pollution Levels To Top The Scale

Defra: Air Pollution Levels To Top The Scale
People with respiratory and heart problems are warned to avoid strenuous activity as smog levels soar in southern Britain.

Air pollution will reach "very high" or "high" levels across much of England on Wednesday, the UK's Environment Department has warned.

The Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) said air pollution will worsen, reaching the top level of 10 in some areas in the South and Midlands.

It said: "High to very high air pollution is expected across much of England to the south of a line from Merseyside across to The Wash."

London will be among the areas worst hit.

Adults and children with lung problems, adults with heart problems, and older people, have been told to avoid strenuous physical activity.

It will be the second day in a row that the country has been hit by heightened smog levels.

Rising smog levels are linked to dust blown from the Sahara

On Tuesday Defra recorded "high" to "very high" air pollution levels across East Anglia, parts of southeast England and around the Humber.

The agency has linked the increased air pollution levels to sandstorms in the Sahara.

A spokesperson told Sky News: "The high level of air pollution this week is due to a combination of local emissions, light winds, pollution from the continent and dust blown over from the Sahara."

Many in the country have woken up over the last few days to see a thin level of red sand coating cars and streets.

The Met Office said: "A large amount of sand and dust was swept up by storm winds in the desert, around 2,000 miles away in northwest Africa.

"The airborne particles were blown north to the UK where they combined with our warm air and were deposited during showers."

Paul Hutcheon at the Met Office added: "We usually see this happen several times a year when big dust storms in the Sahara coincide with southerly winds to bring that dust here.

"More dust rain is possible during showers expected later this week."

However, it seems the high pollution levels won't last for long.

Met Office forecaster Alex Burkill told Sky News: "As we head towards the latter part of this week; Thursday into Friday, the air quality is set to improve.

"By the weekend the air pollution will be low across the UK."

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) air pollution poses the world's most serious environmental health risk.

It found that pollution, ranging from cooking fires to car fumes, was linked to seven million deaths in 2012. That is roughly one in eight.

The biggest pollution-related killers were heart disease, stroke, pulmonary disease and lung cancer, the WHO said.

England is not the only country to be hit by increased smog levels recently.

Last month Paris imposed a day-long driving ban after pollution particles in the air exceeded safe levels for five straight days.

http://news.sky.com/story/1235585/defra-air-pollution-levels-to-top-the-scale

Map on the link

It isn't a funny subject in any way, but I can just see BA thinking the muslims sent the sand!

Haven't noticed it here, although showing up as a bad area, but we are next to miles and miles of open meadows, so I expect that helps.

In my part of the world it's Ozone Level Days. When I was a kid we'd get a few Level Orange (moderate risk) days per summer, then we started seeing more and more Level Red days as the years went by. Lately we've even seen Level Black, which I hadn't even known they had  ::rfth:: ::rfth:: ::rfth:: 

This is smog, really gets into your lungs etc. We used to have it really badly in London many years ago. nearly killed my Grandad walking home from work. Haven't seen reports of anything like this in years.