How the Great London Smog of 1952 killed thousands - Witness History, BBC World Service

[@JoySwiatnik]

My mum was also a midwife during the great smog. She remembers how helpful the blind people were in helping people including the emergency services.

[@razor2k911]

Incredible. This was only 72 years ago. It feels like we are light years away from that era.

[@supaasandy9807]

Believe me. We are not. Not by a long shot. Not by a VERY long shot.

[@elementary5521]

not really, now the west just makes the third world their dumping ground.

[@tonipeterson954]

​@@supaasandy9807 ... you're spot on ... look at the mysterious chemical fog in the UK and USA atm

[@Trund27]

My mother survived this. She was a registered nurse/midwife at the Royal Northern Hospital on Holloway Road. It was horrific. She herself got really sick from the smog.

[@asternoor7523]

Today we are facing this in Lahore, air quality is extremely bad and increasing every year!

[@Bookmode]

Unfortunately, but our Government just thinking about short term changes, no long term solution is exoected.

[@stephenholmgren405]

Here from The Crown, i can't believe thousands died

[@dusanpantic792]

Good series. I'm watching it now. Greetings from Serbia...

[@woodsie5796]

Sounding familiar lately ...

[@michaelk2293]

My father lived in London at the time. I always remember him telling me about it. He told me that when he got home, he used to blow his nose, and it was full of dirty little particles from the smog!

[@judithbg5588]

Yes, I was in grammar school. Walked down the street with my arm stretched in front of me, in case I bumped into someone. Also biked to school, in terror hearing an invisible bus rumbling up the hill behind me!

[@mikeyd946]

I live in Western Canada we are smothered in Wildfire smoke coupled with 37 degree Celsius heat. It is sickening many people. I couldn’t image those folks feeling any different. What a world 😢

[@garryferrington811]

A man-made world.

[@diannshoemaker6419]

@@mikeyd946 When the fires were at their worst in Canada, upstate (central, actually) New York had months of haze and grey skys. Can only imagine how bad it was, closer to the source.

[@samnag8742]

1950s London = 2020s Delhi

[@smurugan12]

70 years behind

[@universeslap]

Or Chengdu or Norilsk...💨😤🤯🤢☠️

[@OutragedPufferfish]

​@@universeslap Norilsk probably looks better than your love life 😋

[@universeslap]

@@OutragedPufferfish here is prime example of classic russian personality trait😘

[@OutragedPufferfish]

@@universeslap I'm right, just admit it. It's the democratic thing to do.

[@vancepomerening4794]

Not as serious but a very similar pollution event happened in Donora, Pennsylvania in 1948.

[@garryferrington811]

Around 1900 - 1920, many such events, and very bad ones, happened throughout the eastern United States, basically anywhere you had a river and burning coal for heat and power.

[@misterakt]

The Crown did an excellent job portraying this in one of their early episodes. Yeah some of it was fabricated (Churchill's secretary never existed), but it seemed very realistic. If I remember right, they actually reenacted a few scenes from this very newsreel footage for it!

[@colinbentley5752]

I was 10 years old living in Catford at this time..coming home from school,I walked right past my house..couldnt see a hand in front of my face..had to retrace my steps & find my front gate..awful..remember blowing my nose & handkerchief covered in black muck..now live in new zealand..what a difference !!..great choice....

[@richardsimms251]

Smart doctor

[@speedracer2841]

I learned about this in The Crown.

[@rosalia4770]

I’m hear after watching The Crown

[@garryferrington811]

Hear, hear! 👂

[@Nagat80592]

My homeland also have PM2.5 at pattaya

[@garryferrington811]

And also: there was no reason this couldn't have been prevented by copying what New York City did earlier in the century: eliminate burning coal!

[@philthomas7140]

History is repeating....1952 --> 2025

[@cecilefox9136]

I once saw " yellow" fog as a young child in N.W.5,early '60's

[@unifiedvision999]

Thousands!

[@diannshoemaker6419]

Actually, old movies of an even older Victorian Era, showed the frequent, but at the time typical London Fog. At the time it was portrayed as a phenomenon of nature. Now i doubt that. But then, why isn't it mention here, if it wasn't ???

[@garryferrington811]

The 1900 novel "The Doom of London" did not portray it as a freak of nature, because it wasn't. The east coast American railroads were electrified in the 'teens and 'twenties because of this.

[@pierzing.glint1sh76]

It could just be the camera quality but this looks even worse than the annual delhi lahore fog at the moment. Atleast we only had to deal with it once, 70 years ago! The key is to learn your lessons lol

[@liberalandfree6267]

I hope things wont reach that bad in Lahore, but the govt should introduce similar to clean air act.

[@biddlelove2135]

I remember it, not one black person died . Check it out.

[@1100boy_Chief]

Forreal?

[@Nayasmih]

Pov you just started watching the crown

[@jamierudberg4843]

Crown season 1

[@marie699]

Same thing in 2025.

[@PaulTuck-o2d]

Smokers had their own little chimney exhaling even more noxious pollution..

[@lokesh303101]

Air Pollution means to say Clean Energy Solutions.

[@somayyamughal8313]

Wow

[@Nikolaceae]

Heute nicht besser

[@BBCWorldService]

Click here to subscribe to our channel 👉🏽 bbc.in/3VyyriM

[@TheFormula313]

👍

[@irigm6132]

I come to know about this from environmental science book.

[@BejoyDeb-o1u]

I am here to know real cause it. It’s my necessary topic of my syllabus ❤ 31 December 2024

[@vinodKumar-jk6fn]

I am a fan of BBC but unable to understand English subtitle. Request also hindi subtitle. Please favour us.

[@mi24sturm35]

Learn English not your shit language

[@garryferrington811]

This was predicted in the novel "The Doom of London" in 1900 (available free online.) Even then, they knew it was coming: today, we have people pooh-poohing the onsetting climate disaster.

[@jacksmith-mu3ee]

India pakistan be like : every year China : we defeated smog without even trying

[@diogorodrigues747]

"China : we defeated smog without even trying" - yeah, because the CCP basically decided to put their industries in the outskirts of major cities instead of inside them, which has improved the air in the big political and financial centres in the detriment of other areas (it's to be said that the situation isn't good though, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, etc. are still very polluted cities). Most of China is incredibily polluted and you can prove that by looking at data for air pollution measured via neutral estimates.

[@jules263]

@@jacksmith-mu3ee You can barely spell. I’ve seen your comments. Tell the CCP you require more schooling lol

[@Thessalonians22-kg8pf]

Southport's always sending airplanes from the army base over the northwest when the sky is too blue & within 2 hours its all grey. They are doing it again soon.

[@garryferrington811]

We had quite a bit of that in Los Angeles. I would see six to eight jets criss-crossing the sky.

[@themoderateecowarrior]

Stop driving every where lazy people. Keep road clear for those who really need it.

[@zefa17]

Bangkok 2025 where AQI Purple for the first time 🥲🥲🥲

[@carlkuss8300]

Lucky it's not like this now (although if you believe sadiq you'd think it is) how would you find all the stabbing victims when you can't see through the smog.

[@christophercooper6731]

Are you a Free Man On the Land? Red-pilled alpha male?

[@jjeverson2269]

This is India today. At least north India

[@NotsoFunnyValentine]

yeah bro...dirty politics is eating my country out. As a person who lives here, though it may not seem that conditions are that bad ( honestly there isn't any crisis or something) but the Government fools these innocent citizens to believe they are on the right track and close to become a "super power" , I mean if you talk about military and space exploration then yes, but apart from that, they are just making a fool out of themselves

[@KORA-LOG]

happen again recently... The Great Smog of Bangkok 2025

[@taka-taktak]

In Delhi there's this kind of pollution without the industrialisation 🥴

[@garryferrington811]

Yes, India has embraced smog. It's sad.

[@InesElm-dj9tn]

SMOGOGO 😂😂😂😂😂

[@TheFormula313]

☪️🇿🇦🎶🇮🇳🌎🎼

[@RUSTA5]

Capitalism 🤷

[@joelashdod7712]

Capitalism? , was Chernobyl also caused by capitalism?

[@RebeccaTurner-ny1xx]

@@joelashdod7712 Stalinist state capitalism. USSR was not a socialist society.

[@Joe_Peroni]

You can tell by the comments here that it's now "Londonistan".

[@cecilefox9136]

😂

[@christophercooper6731]

Racist idiots feel a compulsion to comment, just like thick taxi drivers feel the need to share their (wrong) opinions.

[@RebeccaTurner-ny1xx]

London is certainly more diverse than previously and its air is cleaner than in the 1950s before the Clean Air Act. Of course, the UK has exported its highly-polluting industries to the Global South so we can smugly congratulate ourselves.

[@C345OFR]

What?! Because people in other countries are typing comments likening their current smogs with our smogs of old? 🤣 Brown people must live rent-free in your head, mate!