About

How we picture heatwaves shapes how we understand and respond to them. Yet when heatwaves hit in the news, the pictures accompanying the news story often show people having fun in the sun. These pictures hide the serious impacts of extreme heat on the people and places we care about. They also fail to show how people and places can cope or adapt when living with very hot weather.

Climate change is making heatwaves more frequent and intense around the world, including in the UK. A temperature limit which previously seemed unthinkable for the UK – 40degC – was reached in July 2022. Record hot temperatures keep tumbling: in May this year, London reached 35degC.

This project aims to change the way the media pictures very hot weather. We are investigating why certain images dominate heatwave news; and creating more accurate, inclusive and representative pictures about heatwaves. As well as scientific reports and publications, we will produce practical resources for the media, including the “Heatwave Collection”, a freely-accessible library of heatwave images and videos.

We are a team of social scientists and computer scientists based at the Centre for Climate Communication and Data Science (C3DS) at the University of Exeter. We are working in partnership with a range of media organisations, as well as with stakeholders in public health. You can read more about our team at the people and stakeholder pages.