Volcanic winter, 70ft tsunami & London tornado – UK’s ancient natural disasters

TORNADOES, volcanic winters and 70-foot tsunamis aren’t the first words that come to mind when you think: Britain.

But our small island has been struck by a surprising array of natural disasters.

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So think back to these nightmarish events the next you go to complain about those April showers.

Scottish tsunami

Brits worry about loads of things. Money. Football scores. If jam belongs under or over cream. But we don’t stress about tsunamis.

Sadly if you were living in northeast Scotland around 8,000 years ago, you would’ve been right to panic about it.

That’s because a massive wave that may have reached heights of 70 feet smashed into the Scotland and the Shetland islands.

It was caused by a massive underwater landslide – the infamous Storegga slide – on the edge of Norway’s continental shelf.

Water may have reached 18 miles inland, rinsing 370 miles of Scottish coastline in a “catastrophic flood”. Thankfully coastal holiday lets weren’t a thing then.

But if it happened today, it would’ve caused significant damage to places like Aberdeen and Inverness.

Bizarrely, this wasn’t Britain’s only tsunami – we’ve been struck by several mega-waves over the years.

Sweating sickness

You’ll struggle to find a Brit that hasn’t heard of the Black Death (1300s) or the Great Plague of London (1600s).

But less well-known is the bizarre outbreak of “sweating sickness” in the late 15th and early 16th centuries.

WHAT CAUSES TSUNAMIS?

Here’s what you need to know…

Tsunami is a Japanese word used to describe huge waves – generally on oceans, but sometimes in lakes or large rivers.

Ocean tsunamis are caused by sudden motions, which displace a large amount of water.

This is typically an earthquake, but it could also be a volcanic eruption or underwater landslide.

A huge impact into water – like a large landslide or meteor – can also cause tsunamis.

When an earthquake happens, huge tectonic plates crunch together.

When the “snap” eventually happens, this gives a large shove to water.

This creates a tsunami that travels very quickly across the open oceans.

As the ocean becomes shallower, the tsunami wave is forced upwards.

This means tsunami waves typically grow very quickly in height (and slow down) as they approach the shallow shorelines near land.

Tsunamis are typically a series of waves, rather than one single wave
As they approach land, these waves get closer together.

One of the best ways to spot an incoming tsunami is a sudden retreat of coastal water.

If the tide goes out very quickly, it’s a telling sign that something is wrong.

What you’re actually seeing is the trough of the incoming tsunami wave – on a huge scale.

The initial tsunami impact can be deadly.

But tsunami flooding also drowns people, damages buildings, destroys infrastructure and spreads waste and disease.

Picture Credit: SADATSUGU TOMIZAWA/AFP/Getty Images

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Thousands of Brits are believed to have been struck down and ultimately wiped out by this mysterious disease – and we’re still not exactly sure why.

Victims of the sickness would usually become suddenly ill, and then be dead within hours.

You’d go from feeling a bit cold and dizzy, before quickly descending into a sweaty delirium – and then either recovering, or popping your clogs. Sounds miserable, but that’s the 1400s for you.

Wolf Hall fans might recall (spoilers…) that Thomas Cromwell’s wife and two daughters were offed by the disease. Anne Boleyn is also believed to have survived it, although she didn’t exactly have a happy ending.

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And making the event all the more bizarre, a definitive cause for sweating sickness still hasn’t been found.

St Lucia’s Flood

On December 13/14 in 1287, an enormous storm tide led to one of the largest floods known to history.

Hundreds of people were killed during the horrifying event also called the “Great Storm”.

As many as 180 people died in the village of Hickling, Norfolk, with water reported to have risen a foot above the Priory Church’s high altar.

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But Brits didn’t have it nearly as bad as the Netherlands and Germany, where death tolls are estimated to be between 50,000 and 80,000.

London tornado

When you count the fires, plagues, and a smattering of Viking sackings, London has had a pretty bad lot. That’s before you chuck in a tornado.

It turns out that England’s earliest reported (and possibly strongest) tornado took place in 1091, in the heart of our capital city.

The aptly named London Tornado of 1091 struck on Friday, October 17 and badly damaged the church of St Mary-le-Bow (which is located on London’s Cheapside).

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Several churches were demolished along with over 600 mostly wooden houses. This wasn’t the first or last time London would learn of the perils of using wood as a building material.

The tornado is believed to have rated around F4 on the Fujita scale, which makes it “devastating”. Wind speeds may have reached 213mph.

Chronicling the mad event, William of Malmesbury described it as “a great spectacle for those watching from afar, but a terrifying experience for those standing near”. That’s tornadoes alright.

Thankfully out of a population of 18,000, there are just two known fatalities.

Volcanic winter

If you thought that was bad, consider yourself lucky you weren’t around 1,500 years ago. Summer holidays were cancelled (as was a lot of human life, which is much worse).

A volcanic winter said to have been caused by multiple eruptions cooled the atmosphere for years – causing a big drop in temperatures across Europe, including the UK.

The problem for normal people is that the volcanic winter of 536 wasn’t an isolated catastrophe.

Its devastating crop failures coincided with the Plague of Justinian and general famine.

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Historians reckon that the events collectively caused millions of deaths across Europe during the period.

In fact, historian Michael McCormick famously declared 536 “the beginning of one of the worst periods to be alive, if not the worst year”.