Thank you for publishing a selection of rural scenes in the lovely photographs from the Gloucestershire Camera Club (Thursday 7th December).

One in particular entitled Ozleworth by Elizabeth Oakley caught my eye. It was of what appeared to be a winter’s sunset streaming between the bare trees in a wooded landscape.

It seems to me that this one might better have been printed in your ‘Climate News’ section, not least as that featured an article about ‘fuel for a greener future for aircraft’? However, as the Ozleworth photograph shows, what looks like a winter’s sky is actually one heavily covered with contrails from the motorway of aircraft traffic from Heathrow that streams across the Cotswolds every day on its way to North America and beyond.

Often there is so much artificial cloud in the form of contrails generated by emissions from air travel that it is making a major contribution to a significant warming of the stratosphere and in turn the planet. All of this here in the Cotswolds taking place at 16,000 feet above our heads whilst the planes have at this stage not yet reached full operation height and the roar of their engines can still be heard even at ground level.

I think Elizabeth Oakley has unwittingly captured with her camera what is an everyday but terrifying phenomenon made all the more so by its deceptive beauty.

Revd. Dr Nicholas Henderson

Cirencester