Thunderfly

Meanwhile at the Conference Centre three fire-engines have screamed up. Not, for once, a student smoking in a bedroom: this time a cloud of thunderflies has chosen to swarm on the pearly-pink just-warm globe of a smoke-detector.

The afternoon had turned overcast and sultry, and Sawrey drowsed in the growing July heat. Clouds of tiny midges—thunderflies, people called them—very small and black, and thought to be a sign of a coming storm, gathered in the air all over the village. […] And whilst thunderflies didn’t bite or sting, they got in one’s eyes and one’s mouth and were certainly aggravating.

‘[…] I remember how we had to make for the boat quickly because of the thunderflies.’ / ‘Thunderflies?’ / ‘Biting midges that could make your life a hell. And the mosquitoes too. We called them buzzers because of the sound they made.[…]’