Abstract
THE tercentenary of the Great Fire of London (September 2–5, 1666) has given rise to discussion of the incidental meteorological factors. Atallah1 compares the London fire with that at Hamburg during the Second World War and with the Chicago fire of 1871. He states that the low velocity ground winds at Hamburg and Chicago were ideal for the generation of fire-storms (that is, convection columns in which super-adiabatic atmospheric temperature lapse rates lead to vortices of hurricane force) but that there was no indication of such conditions in the London fire. The purpose of this communication is to consider the inherent (natural) stability or instability of the air mass as a further relevant factor in the manner and intensity of the development of the London fire.
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LAWRENCE, E. Meteorology and the Great Fire of London, 1666. Nature 213, 168–169 (1967). https://doi.org/10.1038/213168a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/213168a0
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