Classrooms hotter than the Sahara?
If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the classroom seems to be a fitting message pupils stuck in sweltering schools built under the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme.
Announcing cuts to the project, Education Secretary Michael Gove detailed how flaws in some schools in Bradford already built under the scheme had left students suffering heat exhaustion as temperatures shot up to 38 degrees Celsius.
The Claim
In his statement to MPs yesterday, Mr Gove said: “In three other BSF schools pupils collapsed from heat exhaustion, as design faults repeatedly sent the temperature up to 38° Celsius; that is hotter than August in the Sahara.”
But does it really get hotter in such classrooms than it does in one of the most inhospitable regions of the planet?
Analysis
Given the size of the Sahara, there is a range of temperatures recorded in different regions, meaning a single figure for ‘the Sahara’ is hard to come by.
However, Full Fact contacted the Met Office for guidance as what figure to use as a rough benchmark, and from they told us, it appears that Mr Gove’s comparison stands up.
As a spokesman explained: “Timbuktu, which is at the northern limit of the summer tropical rain belt, is representative of the southern Sahara and the average daily maximum temperature for August there is 36 C (the highest recorded temperature is 44 C) so as a general temperature this would seem reasonable for the wider region.”
However the Schools Secretary has clearly done his homework when picking which month to use as a point of comparison. August, it seems, is not the hottest month in the Sahara.
“August is actually relatively cool compared to the hottest months of April, May and June when average maximum temperatures are 42 or 43 C. Overnight average temperature for August is 24 C (compared to average minimum during April, May & June of 22 to 27 C),” the Met Office told us.
Conclusion
Despite the potential for variation between different areas of the desert, and the relatively low temperatures experienced in August, the claim made by Michael Gove is accurate. In a small number of cases students were subjected to temperatures above the Saharan average for August.
At least the rest of Bradford was somewhat cooler.
Patrick Casey
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