You might have seen the headlines recently: 'Pollen bomb', 'super pollen'. Scary stuff.
To be honest, there isn't really such a thing as a pollen bomb or super pollen, but there certainly are cases of the weather making pollen conditions worse, even deadly. One particularly scary phenomenon is Thunderstorm Asthma.
The most severe case of Thunderstorm Asthma that I've heard of struck Melbourne, Australia on 21 November 2016.
It was a day when the conditions came together to create the perfect storm:
- Pollen was very high.
- It was a very hot day, with temperatures around 35C.
- It was horribly humid.
- A thunderstorm struck late in the day.
It is believed that because the thunderstorms struck late in the day, the pollen that had aleady settled during the day was swept back into the air.
Once airbourne, the combination of humidity and strong winds smashed the pollen into tiny particles which were then small enough to enter the respiratory system and into the lungs, triggering asthmatic attacks.
Tragically ten people died in the Melbourne's thunderstorm asthma event, and hospitals struggled to cope as 8,500 people sought emergency treatement.
Before you breathe a sigh of relief that the thunderstorm asthma struck Australia, I'm afraid to say that it can also happen far closer to home.
There was also a thunderstorm asthma event in London in July 1994. Over 600 people attended London hospitals in 30 hours, which is about 10 times the usual number.
So it can happen in the UK, but it's definitely rare.