2024-11-24 09:58:41
Sasha Engelmann
Hackney Downs, London, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
NOAA-19
Storm Bert - the 'named storm' that was brewing on the Atlantic when I last contributed to the Archive on Thursday - is sweeping the UK this weekend. "More than 200 flood alerts put in place and three men die on roads as wild weather crosses country" reports the Guardian this morning. The flood alerts are due to the rapid melting of ice and snow across the north of England and Scotland, as the storm brought milder temperatures. Indeed today in London, it is shockingly warm, around 17 degrees- a huge jump from previous days. The Met Office has issued yellow warnings for rain and wind across large swathes of the country into Sunday, and this is felt in London, with gusts battering houses, trees and infrastructure. As I braved the park with my turnstile antenna, I noticed how a mountain of plane tree leaves had been pushed against the fence near the train tracks, drowning two bikes and the fence itself. In the middle of Hackney Downs, the force of the wind meant that people walked with their heads down, hoods pulled over their faces. My laptop flung wildly left and right as I tried to track the satellite pass. The turbulence reminded me of a day back in 2021 when Soph and I went out to Burgess Park to capture an image of Storm Eunice- against the advice of the Met Office- and I had to kneel on my laptop to keep it from flying away. The blustery conditions affected the satellite image I captured today, as I struggled to keep hold of the antenna. Oddly, although the Guardian headlines its reports with various numbers of injuries and deaths across England and Wales, reading further into the reporting, a phrase consistently repeats: 'It was not clear whether the incident was linked to the storm'.