Newspapers run hot and cold over Celsius and Fahrenheit

What’s odd about this set of national newspaper headlines and copy? Let’s start with the latest winter crop...

“-10°C. Britain shivers on coldest night of the year” (Daily Express, 29 December 2014)

“-10c in deep freeze UK” (Daily Mail, 29 December 2014)

“Temperatures will tonight hit lows of -12C – colder than the South Pole – in
Aberdeenshire before the thaw arrives” (Daily Mirror, 29 December 2014)

“Icy blasts will send temperatures plunging to -10C today as parts of the country turn colder than Alaska” (The Sun, 29 December 2014).

“Britons should brace themselves for the coldest night of the year so far as temperatures plunge to a shocking –10C” (Daily Star)

Now here are some of the same papers’ summer stories...

“81°F. Britain’s hottest day of the year, and there’s more on the way” (Daily Express, 4 July 2014)

“Hotter than Spain! Britain to enjoy warmest day of the year as temperatures soar to 80F” (Daily Mail, 2 July 2014)

“Britain heading for first heatwave of year with temperatures to soar to 82F” (Daily Mirror, 5 May 2014)

“LA is experiencing a record-breaking heatwave, with temperatures reaching highs of 113F” (The Sun, 19 September 2014)

“It’s getting hot in here: Britain prepares for imminent record high of 84F” (Daily Star, 20 June 2014)

Yes, I’m sure you noticed. The papers use different scales in summer and winter. Celsius (aka Centigrade) is the preferred winter scale, presumably because everyone can identify easily with 0°C being the freezing point of water, rather than Fahrenheit’s equivalent 32°F.

But, come summer, papers switch to Fahrenheit, believing that 80°F sounds much better - and possibly hotter - than 26°C (or 27°C if you round up the conversion).

Most, but not all, papers now carry both scales in their reports. Younger readers, under 40 say, may well be baffled by the continuing use of Fahrenheit and I would guess that younger reporters and sub-editors are confused too.

I note that the Mirror’s heatwave story in July this year carried the headline “28C scorcher but rain is on the way” just two months after that 82°F headline, as above.

The Sun showed a measure of subtlety by covering both bases with this intro in July: “Brits will swelter in 31˚C temperatures this week... The blistering 87˚F heat will last from Wednesday to Friday...” And I note that it does generally favour Celsius more than its rivals.

I am indebted to the author Ian McEwan for this weather reporting insight. In his latest novel, The Children Act, he muses “on how British newspapers, for maximum impact, report cold weather in Celsius, hot in Fahrenheit.”

And while I’m on about the subject, I note that the Met Office remains frustrated by long-range predictions of heatwaves and deep freezes. In a news blog in October 2013, it scorned “speculation and big headlines” in the Express ahead of that year’s winter:

“The science simply does not exist to make detailed, long-term forecasts for temperature and snowfall”.

Going on Express headlines since I really don’t think the paper cares.