A storm in a teacup: Why Brits like a few days of terrible weather

A stranded vehicle in flood water in Belper, Derbyshire, as the British public has been warned to brace for strengthening winds and lashing rain this week. PA Images

How bad was the worst storm in years, for you? I’m not asking readers around the globe, where extreme weather events are more common, merely directing the question to my fellow Britons.

We were told a few days ago that there was an extreme “red” storm warning because “Storm Eunice” was following “Storm Dudley” to pummel Britain into submission with high winds, high seas and plenty of rain. Flights and trains were cancelled – I know because I was travelling back to London from Scotland. People were told to stay at home, avoid driving, avoid beaches, cliffs and exposed areas, advised that anything that could blow away in their gardens should be nailed down, tied down or otherwise restrained.

The Times newspaper front page called it the “Day of Destruction” with 200 kilometres per hour winds uprooting trees, tearing down power lines and leaving around a quarter of a million homes in England and Wales without electricity. At least three people were killed, cars damaged by fallen trees and part of the roof of the O2 arena was torn off. Part of the spire of a church in the west of England also blew away.

All very dramatic stuff. But hold on. Was it really?

It does not minimise the damage and disruption to our lives to note that having one or two days of bad weather in mid-winter on an island in northern Europe is not entirely surprising. Storm Eunice was worse than usual, but it reminds us that the British have a very odd relationship with our generally fairly temperate, unexceptional weather.

In summer temperatures rarely hit 30°C. After a few days of sunshine, every British newspaper calls it a “scorcher” and shows pictures of crowded beaches with dire warnings that “too much sun” can be dangerous. In winter (except in the Scottish highlands and mountains) the temperature rarely goes more than a few degrees below zero. My children are constantly disappointed by the lack of snow. More than a few inches and the British regard it as a trip to Siberia. But the truth is that the weather is one of the few safe areas of conversation when two British strangers meet.

On my daily walks with my dog in this friendly corner of England, no one ever opens a conversation about coronavirus, Russia possibly invading Ukraine or the political mess at Westminster. That would be rude. Astonishingly rude. When meeting a stranger, instead, British people focus on two safe topics – our beloved dogs (if we have one), and our weather. “A bit chilly,” is one friendly February gambit, or during Storm Eunice my fellow dog walkers would nod and say “it’s a bit rough” or a “nasty old day". Weather is Britain’s social lubricant, and therefore every British newspaper and TV news editor knows that it’s a great picture story and distraction from the real unpleasantness of life.

This year, as with every British storm every year, every newspaper has roughly the same pictures of huge waves hitting a lighthouse, cars crushed under falling trees and perhaps flooded homes. Secretly, the British love it all. Record numbers of us tuned in to a YouTube Channel, Big Jet TV, to watch aircraft land under the difficult weather conditions at commercial airports. And beyond the weather being part of our British national conversation, it serves an even greater purpose. It is the great British national distraction. We have plenty to be distracted from.

To put all this “red” warning damage and destruction into perspective, the deaths of three people (so far) in weather-related incidents is, of course, extremely sad for them and their loved ones. But the average daily death rate from coronavirus is currently 128 per day. More than 160,000 British people have died with coronavirus in total. The dramatic weather pictures also distract us from the fact that, according to recent reports, almost 200,000 Russian troops are massed around the borders of Ukraine, with some already occupying parts of that country in Crimea and the Donbas, and predictions of the biggest land war in Europe since 1945.

Or there is that further piece of dismal news that London’s Metropolitan Police are investigating the possibility that Prime Minister Boris Johnson broke the law by attending numerous parties where alcohol was available in Downing Street and while the rest of the country was in coronavirus lockdown and generally obeying the rules that Mr Johnson imposed. Or there is that recurrent national toothache, Brexit, with all the long lorry queues and added bureaucracy caused by Mr Johnson’s badly thought out Brexit agreement. It has produced not only months of unrelenting disruption to businesses but also raised the possibility of renewed violence in Northern Ireland.

So here is the guilty British secret: we actually like a few days of terrible weather, because it is never all that terrible. We don’t have typhoons or 50°C temperatures or metres of snowfall, ever. And weather gives us something safe to talk about, and something that no human – neither in government nor business, nor anyone else – can do anything about.