Gaby
The Ministry of Health keeps warning that the right to breathe freely may be one of the last remaining basic rights we still have. There’s a catch. Try taking a deep breath in Kyiv and the surrounding areas at the start of autumn and you’ll regret it fast. This year, September walks were almost impossible without a protective mask—an item many of us had shoved back on a shelf since the COVID era—or even a respirator, which authorities recommended in their Telegram channels. They also advised keeping windows tightly shut and limiting time spent outdoors. Most people treat that kind of advice with the same skepticism seasoned smokers apply to health warnings on cigarette packs—essentially ignoring them. Warnings about a dust storm coming from the Caspian Sea feel trivial compared with everything else happening around us. Still, air quality is getting worse, and this is a global problem. More than seventy years ago there was no Chernobyl, no catastrophic levels of exhaust in the atmosphere, and none of the pollution that now chokes our rivers and oceans. Yet Europe faced a different ecological disaster back then—one that had tragic consequences and nearly wiped out an entire city.
The First Test for the Queen
1952 was a momentous year for Britain. In February, after the death of King George VI, 26-year-old Elizabeth II became queen. Her coronation wouldn’t happen until the summer of 1953, but the end of 1952 delivered one of her first serious tests as monarch. On December 5, Londoners—including members of the royal family and the Prime Minister—opened their curtains that morning only to find they couldn’t see anything at all. The thick fog—normally a staple of Foggy Albion—was in this case a yellow-brown anomaly, mixed with smoke, soot, and car exhaust, and it smothered the city for five days. That winter arrived early and much colder than usual. Coal use surged, and much of the coal being burned was low quality. People huddled by their fireplaces while industrial plants belched smoke like steam engines.
The next day the smog—a blend of the words “smoke” and “fog”—grew so dense that visibility in parts of the city dropped to about one meter. Navigating the streets became perilous; drivers abandoned cars in the middle of roads and walked, and there were tragic incidents of vehicles striking pedestrians because people simply couldn’t see. Public transport, apart from the Underground, ground to a halt. Air travel was out of the question for the week that followed. The fog also crippled emergency services: hospitals were overwhelmed with patients suffering severe coughs and lung problems, and many people had to find their own way to medical care.
From Oatmeal to Pea Soup
Poor air quality has plagued London for centuries. Complaints about smoke and pollution rose in the 17th century after ineffective laws about coal burning were passed during the reign of King James I. Rapid industrialization made matters worse. By the 19th century, thick fog had become a trademark of the capital—a nuisance many accepted as the price of warmth and industry. Usually chimney smoke dispersed into the atmosphere, but in December 1952 an anticyclone parked over the region and created a temperature inversion: smoke and pollutants were trapped close to the ground, forming a toxic, sulfurous veil that hung over the city for five days. Journalists, struck by the unusual color, dubbed it “pea soup,” and the name stuck.
Data from the British Meteorological Office show that from December 5 to 9 roughly 1,000 tons of smoke and soot particles, 2,000 tons of carbon dioxide, 140 tons of hydrochloric acid, 14 tons of fluorine compounds, and 370 tons of sulfur dioxide entered London’s air each day. Those hazardous emissions were linked to the burning of low-quality coal. The result was a sharp rise in respiratory infections—especially pneumonia and bronchitis. It wasn’t just people who suffered: at an agricultural exhibition in Smithfield, central London, 12 cows suffocated from the soot-laden air and another 160 fell ill. For the newly crowned queen it was shocking; for Prime Minister Winston Churchill it was a political crisis. The press, reflecting public anger, blasted the government for doing nothing. The first response from British officials was simply to wait for the fog to clear.
The opposition, led by Labour leader Clement Attlee, seized the moment. Their main complaint was that a state of emergency had descended on the capital—transport stopped, people were gasping for air, hospitals were overflowing—and the government offered no response. Netflix’s The Crown dramatizes the episode: in episode four of season one, Queen Elizabeth summons Churchill and asks what is happening outside. “It’s just fog, and it will clear soon, Your Majesty,” he replies. If the show’s version is to be believed, Churchill held a hospital briefing a few days later that played like a masterclass in political PR, and newspapers the next morning ran headlines such as “A Strong Leader in Difficult Times.”
It took four years for a real policy response. In 1956 Parliament passed the Clean Air Act, which banned the burning of dirty fuels in certain areas, created smoke-free zones, and set new emissions standards for vehicles. The law also provided subsidies to help homeowners convert from coal stoves. With modifications, that legislation is still on the books today—though the environmental challenges of the present now fall to a new monarch, the next Prime Minister, and recently re-elected city leaders.
