to think that many folk in the UK don't understand how dangerous extreme heat is?

[FunnysInLaJardin]

Seriously, telling a teacher to suck it up in a classroom with no aircon and 30 kids at 40 degrees.

I have many times experienced this kind of heat and you have to keep cool, otherwise it is truly dangerous

Anyone who CAN keep their kids at home today ought to be doing so IMO.

Your DH sounds lovely.

if it was a funeral I'd arranged I'd be ok with him turning up in much lighter clothing, I certainly would prefer him (&his staff) were as cool as they could be! (Probably a little sniffy at speedos!, but anything above that would be fine by me)

Our school have given the option to keep kids home, so mine will be staying home. I’m lucky we are able to do this, but the way I see it is that the kids won’t be doing any real learning & 2 less bodies in the classroom is doing the teacher a favour.

I’ll be working as usual but if I can avoid the DC being miserable & having to walk home in the heat, I will.

Well clearly not as it's supposed to break all recorded temperatures 🙄🙄

pre covid I'd regularly go to a beautiful village in France where you can pretty much guarantee 32-36 for the entire time. I loved it & miss it a lot. However, there's a beautiful river with plenty of easily accessible places to dip your feet in the river, swim if you want to. An abundance of cafes/restaurants/bars/ice cream places to get cold drinks & light food, air conditioned shops/museums and I'm on holiday, with time to enjoy that.

the people that live & work there, have homes/businesses that better suit the climate and the people like chefs are acclimatised to it. We aren't, our homes/schools/businesses aren't set up for it.

take care everyone (even the ones who don't understand the need for it)

Why the suggestion to keep kids at home ? If you go to the pub today and the kitchen is shut as sorry too hot for the chef , same if you want a takeaway. You need something from the shops sorry we are shut too hot or it’s open but no stock because the staff that are employed to sell the stock distribution etc are not in work because it’s toooo hot .
honestly people give no shits for them people but will be the first to complain that they can’t go about their day .
imo bringing up a generation of snowflakes if you keep your dc at home today . They will be hot at home so what’s the point. Teach them that they have to carry on no matter what not down tools cause it’s too hot . It’ll rain on Wednesday so chill out !!

I do think teachers have it rough. Thirty plus people in one room with little to no ventilation. Children who will flop about (understandably) moaning about the heat. Etc etc

but I think you're a little naive to think Hospitals have air con. Like schools they have windows that barely open & if you beg you might get someone to find your 6/8 bed ward a desk fan.

many restaurants/offices will not have aircon.

teachers have it bad, but they aren't the only ones.

@TruthHertz

I'd be wearing bike shorts (or if a bloke boxers) & putting heavy work trousers on only when getting out!

taking a chilly bin full of iced drinks. Fan for the dash.

take care

Yip, I'm one of the ones wearing body armour for 12 hours in a car with no air con. Obviously, just have to crack on, plenty of water, and take it easy if I can (unlikely due to low numbers and the high number of calls). We have a saying, "it is what it is, but your big girl/boy pants on and deal with it" Unfortunately, we use that saying lot, but then I didn't sign up for an easy ride. It is a demanding environment to work in as is the rest of the jobs that are mentioned in the post. My team is great, very resilient, and watch out for each other, strong-willed etc. I'm sure we'll cope.

@timeisswoopingby Do you think wards have air conditioning?
Older offices have air conditioning?
We never had air conditioning at school and ....we continued to go to school, in a continuosly hotter place than the UK and guess what....no one died!
As I say, others have to go to work in an actual physical job without the luxury of sir conditioning and lightweight clothing.
The hysteria in the UK because of a few days sunshine is ridiculous!
Let's not forget that the ones wanting schools etc to close are pretty much the same ones who will be getting on a plane to holiday somewhere hot and sunny over the next few weeks.
They're not complaining then are they.

It's going to be 28 at most here today which I think we have seen before ? I have been contemplating keeping my dd off school but not sure now.

The lowest temperature possible isn't 0, it's absolute zero (0 Kelvin, or minus 273 celsius). Our Celsius scale simply sets 0 at the freezing point of water for convenience as that's the sort of temperature range we mainly operate in.

So in Fahrenheit the average is 68, and 104 is forecast.
And in Kelvin the average is 293, and 313 is forecast.

Neither of those numbers are "double", are they?

dh just walked the dog and got yelled at that it’s too hot… it’s currently 19 degrees. People are going nuts.

@Dishh

If the room has low humidity then ok, but the UK climate is already relatively humid. Mind you, the air conditioning also works by reducing the level of humidity in the room, not adding to it. I grew up in a Mediterranean country and the difference in real-feel temperatures there and in the UK is noticeable - the UK feels hotter at the same temperature because of the humidity and sweat pooling.

Some pig ignorance on this thread. Usual tropes about teachers' holidays and working hours thrown in for good measure.

School workers who are worrying about the heat aren't wanting a day off eating ice lollies FFS. They are worried about overheating children. Your children.

Stupidity writ large.

What is it with teachers and GP surgeries these days?

It seems they can't wait to shut shop at the first opportunity while everyone else just finds ways to ''soldier on''.

Of course we understand the impact of extreme heat.

I think your real question is ''why can't school all shut down today''...

And the answer is because not every parent can't take two days off to look after their kids at short notice and because the entire country can't stop because it is hot so why should schools?

Schools have had time to plan and find ways to cope: fans, making sure pupils stay in the shade, lighter activities, plenty of water. Same that if the children were at home.

I wonder how they cope on all those other warm climate across the world that don't have air conditioning 🙄

Yes, go on. It will really boost the ice lolly industry.

Its amazing how many parents are happy for their children to struggle in conditions which are worse than or the equivalent of those working in the most challenging professions just so teachers don’t think they are ‘special’. Let’s just get children climbing up chimneys again, shall we? The jealousy over the long holidays is a huge factor, in my opinion. My school is already on summer break but I feel very sorry for those staff and children in the SE and central belt who aren’t. It really is a race to the bottom.

If it is decided that schools are closing in your area, then you should have emergency childcare in place. What would you do if your child had diarrhoea or chickenpox?

GPs and teachers. Can’t do with us but can’t do without us. We didn’t start a global pandemic or cause a heat wave, you know.

Take umbrellas with you, it shades you from the sun more than a hat would etc

The trouble with a changing climate is that it takes a very long time to become acclimatised. It takes even longer when there are infrastructure issues involved. Our homes, schools and many of our other structures weren’t planned with these temperatures in mind.

Seriously, telling a teacher to suck it up in a classroom with no aircon and 30 kids at 40 degrees.

If you don’t have underlying health conditions then they are hardly putting their lives on the line - if it’s that ‘dangerous’ surely our first thoughts should be to keep the children safe.
Not sure why teachers were seen as appropriate Covid fodder during the the pandemic but a hot day at work somehow crosses the line.

If heatwaves in these sort of temperatures become the norm, and sadly it looks to be going that way, then I believe the UK areas most affected will have to rethink how they do school terms. In traditionally hot European countries schools break up in mid June until early September. Cultures more adapted to hot weather don't send their kids to school in the summer heat but Brenda and Ken on Facebook know better because they went to school in 1976 and lived to tell the tale.

As this is the 10,000th thread about the 2 day heatwave in the UK, I DO actually think 99.9% of Mumsnetters now understand how dangerous extreme heat it and can we talk about something else now.

Yep. Every single one of us. A few posters show this behaviour, so obviously we all are.

These threads makes me laugh seriously.