Smoking Summers And Wild Winters: The UK Continues To Suffer From Extreme Weather

Over the last year, the UK has experienced an increase in extreme weather. According to the Met Office, the UK’s current climate is vastly different from just a few decades ago. In summer 2025, the UK experienced four distinct heatwaves, making it the hottest summer on record – and this is not an anomaly: the last three years have been among the five warmest since records began in 1884. One consequence of this increasingly extreme weather is natural disasters. Heatwaves have resulted in wildfires all over Europe, including France, Greece, Spain and Turkey. And it isn’t just heat: winters in the UK have also experienced harsher weather conditions. In 2024/25, the UK experienced six storms; in 2025/26, there have already been six so far. Storm Chandra is the third major storm to hit the UK in January 2026 – after Goretti and Ingrid – bringing heavy gales and persistent rainfall, leading to flooding.

It can be particularly challenging for organizations to deal with extreme weather. Operations are often disrupted for safety reasons, and lone workers can be left vulnerable in high-risk situations. Firms have traditionally relied on a reactive ‘respond and recover’ approach to flooding, rather than implementing proactive, long-term solutions. This has meant closing during the flood and relying on insurance claims to cover damages. Critical event management (CEM) software instead enables organizations to take a more proactive approach that can anticipate weather events such as flooding further ahead of time. These solutions have grown in popularity: according to the 2025 Verdantix EHS survey, they were the second-most rolled-out digital technology across EHS functions globally. CEM solutions integrate with specialized weather tracking tools to provide real-time alerts. For example, Everbridge offers severe weather monitoring and alerting capabilities to prepare and respond to inclement weather. This has helped US-based energy firm Ameren deal with snow and ice storms by sending key information to employees at specific locations, informing them about the routes that were still safe to drive.

Lone workers are often vulnerable during severe weather as there is no access to immediate aid and remote locations can have poor connectivity, making it difficult to report accidents. Lone worker devices provide 24/7, real-time GPS location monitoring to help pinpoint a worker’s whereabouts. Since March 2024, lone worker safety specialist Trackplot has collaborated with the UK Met Office, integrating the National Severe Weather Warning Service (NSWWS) and Met Office DataPoint into its monitoring platform. Trackplot can now show the real-time weather conditions at a worker’s location and trigger alerts to both workers and their managers when there are signs of severe weather.

As climate change continues to create more extreme weather conditions, the likelihood of flooding and heatwaves in the UK will grow. It will become increasingly important for firms to have tools that can help protect their workers during these events, with clear streamlined action plans to limit exposure. This will help foster a more proactive approach that reduces the risk of accidents or injuries caused by these harsh conditions. To read more about how EHS software can help tackle extreme weather, visit the Verdantix research portal.