[01:05.75]ADAM:So, Michelle, shall we make a start on our presentation?
[01:09.84]We haven't got that much time left.
[01:11.72]MICHELLE:No, Adam. But at least we've done all the background reading.
[01:16.16]I found it really interesting — I'd never even heard of the Laki eruption before this.
[01:21.47]ADAM:Me neither. I suppose 1783 is a long time ago.
[01:26.03]MICHELLE:But it was a huge eruption and it had such devastating consequences.
[01:30.91]ADAM:I know. It was great there were so many primary Sources to look at. It really gives you a sense of how catastrophic the volcano was.
[01:40.86]People were really trying to make sense of the science for the first time.
[01:45.19]MICHELLE:That's right.
[01:46.25]But what I found more significant was how it impacted direct and indirectly on political events, as well as having massive social and economic consequences.
[01:56.93]ADAM:I know. That should be the main focus of our presentation.
[02:01.03]MICHELLE:The observations made by people at the time were interesting, weren't they?
[02:05.63]I mean, they all gave a pretty consistent account of what happened, even if they didn't always use the same terminology.
[02:14.05]ADAM:Yeah. I was surprised there were so many weather stations established by that time — so, you know, you can see how the weather changed, often by the hour.
[02:23.68]MICHELLE:Right. Writers at the time talked about the Laki haze to describe the volcanic fog that spread across Europe.
[02:31.95]They all realised that this wasn't the sort of fog they were used to — and of course this was in pre-industrial times — so they hadn't experienced sulphur-smelling fog before.
[02:42.89]ADAM:No, that's true.
[02:44.23]MICHELLE:Reports from the period blamed the haze for an increase in headaches, respiratory issues and asthma attacks.
[02:51.45]And they all describe how it covered the sun and made it look a strange red colour.
[02:57.40]ADAM:Must have been very weird.
[03:00.00]MICHELLE:It's interesting that Benjamin Franklin wrote about the haze.
[03:04.07]Did you read that? He was the American ambassador in Paris at the time.
[03:08.90]ADAM:Yeah. At first no one realised that the haze was caused by the volcanic eruption in lceland.
[03:15.26]MICHELLE:It was Benjamin Franklin who realised that before anyone else.
[03:19.50]ADAM:He's often credited with that, apparently.
[03:22.29]But a French naturalist beat him to it — I can't remember his name. I'd have to look it up.
[03:27.68]Then other naturalists had the same idea - all independently of each other.
[03:33.05]MICHELLE:Oh right. We should talk about the immediate impact of the eruption, which was obviously enormous — especially in Iceland, where so many people died.
[03:45.88]ADAM:Mmm. You'd expect that — and the fact that the volcanic ash drifted so swiftly — but not that the effects would go on for so long.
[03:54.42]Or that two years after the eruption, strange weather events were being reported as far away as North America and North Africa.
[04:02.03]MICHELLE:No. I found all that hard to believe too.
[04:06.31]It must have been terrible — and there was nothing anyone could do about it, even if they knew the ash cloud was coming in their direction.
[04:52.20]MICHELLE:We should run through some of the terrible consequences of the eruption experienced in different countries.
[04:58.33]There's quite a varied range.
[05:00.74]ADAM:Starting with Iceland, where the impact on farming was devastating.
[05:05.76]MICHELLE:Mmm. One of the most dramatic things there was the effect on livestock as they grazed in the fields.
[05:12.81]They were poisoned because they ate vegetation that had been contaminated with fluorine as a result of the volcanic fallout.
[05:20.42]ADAM:That was horrible.
[05:22.29]In Egypt, the bizarre weather patterns led to a severe drought and as a result the Nile didn't flood, which meant the crops all failed.
[05:31.91]MICHELLE:It's so far from where the eruption happened and yet the famine there led to more people dying than any other country.
[05:40.49]It was worse than the plague.
[05:42.56]ADAM:OK. Then in the UK the mortality rate went up a lot — presumably from respiratory ilinesses.
[05:50.34]According to one report it was about double the usual number and included an unusually high percentage of people under the age of 25.
[05:59.47]MICHELLE:Mmm. I think people will be surprised to hear that the weather in the USA was badly affected too.
[06:07.61]George Washington even makes a note in his diary that they were snowbound until March in Virginia.
[06:15.00]That was before he became president.
[06:17.30]ADAM:Yes, and there was ice floating down the Mississippi, which was unprecedented.
[06:22.46]MICHELLE:Astonishing, really. Anyway, what do you think ...
