scienceillustrated.com.auscienceillustrated.com.au || 67 67
By Antje Gerd Poulsen
Trafalgar Square on 5 December
1952 – the fog has just settled.
When it lifts five days later, the
death toll has quadrupled.
BETTMANN/GETTY IMAGES
T
he crisis began on Sunday, 5th of
December 1952 with a thick,
classic London "pea-souper", but
as night fell, the fog became
extraordinarily dense, and
visibility dropped to just a few metres.
During the days and nights that followed,
things got worse. A toxic, sulphur yellow
mixed with black and brown hues in fog banks
which shrouded the streets. In Heathrow
Airport, the visibility was only 10 metres in the
mornings, making flight impossible.
During the night, pedestrians struggled
to find their way through even in familiar
neighbourhoods. In some places, the
visibility was so poor that people could not
see their own feet. Barbara Fewster, who
was on her way through London in a car with
her fiancé late on the Sunday night,
remembers it as follows:
“It was the worst fog I had ever
experienced. It was yellowish and it smelled
very much of sulphur. I had to get out of our
car and walk in front of it to lead the way.
"We did not dare to stop, as that was
much more dangerous than continuing. You
could not see the rear lights of other cars,
before you hit them.”
Motorists heading into the city faced a
seemingly solid wall of smog. So foul was
the stench, so alarming the colour, density
and acridity, many travellers simply gave up
going any further, and buses and cars were
abandoned by the roadside.
LACK OF COFFINS AND FLOWERS
There was even smog indoors, and theatres
and cinemas had to close, because nobody
could see what was happening on the city's
stages and screens.
Parents were advised to make their kids
skip school for fear of them getting lost in
the fog. At a livestock show in Smithfield,
the cattle died, but still, nobody had any idea
how bad things were. All that Londoners
knew for sure was that the smog was
everywhere. And as it roiled, black dust
particles covered buildings, trees, cars, and
humans, entering air passages and settling
in delicate lung tissue.
Everywhere, Londoners were coughing,
as they tried to find their way through the
