August summary: world on fire and the Lionesses denied at the last hurdle

This month it was the turn of Hawaii to be devastated by wildfires, with hundreds killed on the island of Maui, the deadliest wildfire in modern American history. There were also major wildfires in other parts of the world, notably Canada's Northwest Territories and British Columbia. In addition to carbon dioxide emissions, Chinese scientists estimate that 110 million tonnes of nitrous oxide and methane equivalent were emitted from fires in Canada this year.

Canadian wildfires
Source: Reuters

Last month southern Europe was ravaged by fire and the devastation of the Greek island of Rhodes brought back memories of our visit to this beautiful island 50 years ago this month. Barbara, Amanda and I spent a few days there during a stopover in Greece on our return to the UK from our four year spell on the Zambian Copperbelt.

Barbara and Amanda in Athens and Rhodes, August 1973

Five years later I was back in Greece with a group of CSM students on an industrial tour and we visited the island of Evia, also ravaged by the July wildfires. We visited the magnesite processing plant at Manthoudi where we saw hand sorting of magnesite from serpentine on a moving conveyor by a team of female operators. I would guess this is now done by electronic sorters- has anyone any information?

Hand sorting at Manthoudi

In one of its worst recent summers the UK has fortunately missed the extreme heat and fire and in the middle of the month Falmouth was buzzing, with around 750 international captains and crew members in town for the start of the Magellan-Elcano Tall Ships race. But it was not to be, as the inclement weather forced the organisers to cancel the start in Falmouth, which would have been preceded by the spectacular Parade of Sail. Nevertheless the five Class A square-rigged ships moored in the docks were an impressive sight, with long queues of some of the 100,000 visitors who had flocked to the town to visit the ships. 

Meanwhile in Europe Jon and family holidayed in Austria and Slovenia, and I think I must add Lake Bled in Slovenia to my wish-list of places to visit:

There can be no more intense rivalry in international sport than the clashes between England and Australia. One of the greatest ever cricket Test Match series was played in England in July, with a final result a 2-2 draw, but with Australia retaining the "Ashes" trophy.  This month England's netball team lost to Australia in the World Cup Final in Cape Town, but England's honours were restored on the 16th of the month by the women's football team, beating Australia 3-1 in the semi-final of the World Cup, in front of a hostile home crowd in Sydney.

The fact that the "Lionesses" lost to Spain 1-0 in a hard fought final did not detract from beating the old enemy on their home turf. They were the first senior England football team to play in a World Cup final since 1966 and the only one ever to to do so on foreign soil.

Well done the Lionesses who have brought some light into the prevailing gloom of our summer and hard to believe that in 1921 the English Football Association announced a ban on women's football "The game of football is quite unsuitable for females and ought not to be encouraged". The ban was not lifted until 1970. How the women's game has come on since then, and I hope that the skill-levels shown by all the teams in the World Cup will inspire a new generation of women footballers to lift the game to ever increasing heights.

Despondent Lionesses and jubilant Spain, the better side on the night

Finally we must applaud India's scientists for landing the first ever spacecraft near the south pole of the moon, a completely unexplored region. Scientists believe the Moon's craters that are permanently in shadow may hold frozen water and India's third lunar mission came days after Russia's unmanned spacecraft span out of control and crashed into the Moon.

@barrywills