A long-running heat wave that has already shattered previous records across the U.S. will persist, baking parts of the West with dangerous temperatures that will soar into the 100s and holding the East in its hot and humid grip throughout the week, forecasters said Sunday.
An excessive heat warning — the National Weather Service's highest alert — was in effect for about 36 million people, or about 10% of the population, said NWS meteorologist Bryan Jackson. Dozens of locations in the West and Pacific Northwest were expected to tie or break previous heat records, he said.
That was certainly the case over the weekend: Many areas in Northern California surpassed 110 degrees (43.3 C), with the city of Redding topping out at a record 119 (48.3 C). Phoenix set a new daily record Sunday for the warmest low temperature: it never got below 92 F (33.3 C).
Las Vegas on Saturday tied the record of 115 F (46 C), last reached in 2007, and on Sunday the city was flirting with a record high of 118 F (47.7 C).
Marko Boscovich said the best way to beat the heat in Las Vegas is in a seat at a slot machine with a cold beer inside an air-conditioned casino.
“But you know, after it hits triple digits it’s about all the same to me,” said Boscovich, who was visiting from Sparks, Nevada, to see a Dead & Company concert Saturday night at the Sphere.
Temperatures in Oregon were expected to exceed 100 degrees Fahrenheit (37.7 degrees Celsius) on Sunday and soar as high as 115 degrees (46.1 C) in some parts of California, Jackson said. On the more-humid East Coast, temperatures above 100 degrees were expected, though no excessive heat advisories were in effect for the region on Sunday.
On Saturday, Raleigh, North Carolina, reached an all-time record high of 106 degrees F (41.1 C), with a maximum heat index of 118 F (47.7 C), he said.
“Drink plenty of fluids, stay in an air-conditioned room, stay out of the sun, and check up on relatives and neighbors,” read a National Weather Service advisory for the Baltimore area. “Young children and pets should never be left unattended in vehicles under any circumstances.”
Rare heat advisories were extended even into higher elevations including around Lake Tahoe, on the border of California and Nevada, with the National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada, warning of “major heat risk impacts, even in the mountains.”
“How hot are we talking? Well, high temperatures across (western Nevada and northeastern California) won't get below 100 degrees (37.8 C) until next weekend,” the service posted online. “And unfortunately, there won't be much relief overnight either."
Indeed, Reno hit a high of 104 F (40 C) on Saturday, smashing the old record of 101 F (38.3 C).
More extreme highs are in the near forecast, including 129 F (53.8 C) for Sunday at Furnace Creek, California, in Death Valley National Park, and then around 130 F (54.4 C) through Wednesday.
The hottest temperature ever officially recorded on Earth was 134 F (56.67 C) in July 1913 in Death Valley, eastern California, though some experts dispute that measurement and say the real record was 130 F (54.4 C), recorded there in July 2021.
In Arizona’s Maricopa County, which encompasses Phoenix, there have been at least 13 confirmed heat-related deaths this year, along with more than 160 other deaths suspected of being related to heat that are still under investigation, according to a recent report.
That does not include the death of a 10-year-old boy last week in Phoenix who suffered a “heat-related medical event” while hiking with family at South Mountain Park and Preserve, according to police.
In California, crews worked in sweltering conditions to battle a series of wildfires across the state.
In Santa Barbara County, northwest of Los Angeles, the Lake Fire had scorched more than 20 square miles (53 square kilometers) of dry grass, brush and timber after breaking out Friday. There was no containment by Sunday morning. The blaze was burning through mostly uninhabited wildland, but some rural homes were under evacuation orders.
High temperatures were expected in the area through the week, with little relief from the heat even at night.
At the Waterfront Blues Festival in Portland, Oregon, music fans coped by drinking cold water, seeking shade or freshening up under water misters. Organizers of the weekend revelries also advertised free access to air conditioning in a nearby hotel.
Angelica Quiroz, 31, kept her scarf and hat wet and applied sunscreen.
“Definitely a difference between the shade and the sun,” Quiroz said Friday. “But when you’re in the sun, it feels like you’re cooking.”
In a previous version of this story, the name Angelica Quiroz was incorrectly spelled Angela Quiroz. This story has been edited to correct the spelling of Redding, California.
© Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
25 Comments
Login to comment
NB
I would like to say that this heat wave is a manifestation of a malignant climate crisis which must be tackled urgently.
kaimycahl
Drove through Death Valley on the way to Las Vegas and back home. Many people stopped their cars and got out just to experience the heat while driving through Death Valley National Park. There were also a number of cars and trucks on the side of the freeway that experience overheating. There is signs along the 15 freeway asking those who drive through to turn their AC off. What an experience!
theFu
We had high temperatures and no rain for 2 weeks in June. Last Friday, it started raining and we are into the summer rain pattern of 30-50% rain chances daily, every afternoon, which comes just when the heat is getting started. The rain cools everything about 5 deg, which can be nice. It also keeps the plants happy.
There will probably be a few more weeks of ZERO rain this summer, where watering is required to prevent the grass from dying off. I'm in the SE US. We usually get 63 inches (160cm) of rain every year, so it is fairly wet.
Denver sees about 15 inches (38cm) a year. Huge difference. Eastern NE, Eastern KS and every where east of there ( Missouri river .... ) gets much more rain.
For everyone west of the Missouri River, they get the high temperatures AND very little, if any, rain. Completely different climate there.
Climate changes take decades to happen and decades to correct. Humans have been altering the climate for about 100 yrs now, so it will take about 100 yrs of consistent, corrective action to make any real changes to the climate. Of course, the Earth's climates is self-correcting, eventually, if we haven't already pushed it over the point where it becomes a greenhouse like Venus. Eventually, the Earth will be pushed in to an ice age again. Nobody alive will be here for that. Our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren will have to deal with the hotter temperatures and all that comes with those. No way around it at this point, even if we stop all greenhouse gas emissions immediately and force 80% of humans to starve because they can't work and earn a living.
/dev/random
We haven't, and we will not. Please don't repeat this hyperalarmist nonsense. Of all the bad things climate change will bring—and, yes, it will absolutely bring bad things—this is not going to happen. It's simply not possible on Earth.
NB
There are excellent ways to earn a living without burning petroleum.
NB
The natural world, the physical world, is not dictated by your wishes, by what is convenient to you, and by your desire to deny and ignore the alarm.
/dev/random
True, it is dictated by physics. And physics dictate that a runaway greenhouse is not possible on Earth.
gcFd1
Oh--can you explain that? And you mean anyone who proposes otherwise is wrong?
NB
= UNTRUE
Physical theory cannot contradict experimental facts.
Another recent article in JT related to the pertinent general topic, reported about a runaway melting of Antarctic ice sheets.
/dev/random
Yes. But I'd rather someone more knowledgeable explain it, let's say Climatologist James Hansen:
"even with burning of all fossil fuels the tropical ocean does not 'boil'."
(from "Making Things Clearer: Exaggeration, Jumping the Gun, and The Venus Syndrome")
Yes. What are you getting at?
"Experimental facts"? What are you talking about? Who, in experiment, has shown a runaway greenhouse on Earth?
While they have the word "runaway" in common, a "runaway melting" is not a "runaway greenhouse".
albaleo
I'm probably being pedantic, but it is dictated by nature. Physics is a human activity, and we humans get things wrong from time to time.
But I agree that the vast majority of scientific opinion is that the earth will not become like Venus - at least not for a billion years or two.
NB
in his 2013 article cited above by dev/random, James Hansen asserts that
*"The dominance of amplifying feedbacks and the resulting high climate sensitivity make Earth susceptible to what we can call a mini-runaway. By mini-runaway, I refer to a case with an amplifying feedback large enough that the total feedback reaches runaway (the infinite series above does not converge), but eventually that process runs out of fuel."*
He also asserts that
"But it is not an exaggeration to suggest, based on best available scientific evidence, that burning all fossil fuels could result in the planet being not only ice-free but human-free."
Theory always relates assumptions to conclusions. The assumptions can be realistic or not. The inference can be precise/true or not. Eventually, there are facts and results. Is the assumption that only fossil fuels will be burnt realistic? What about the biomass (vegetations and animals, including humans), which will be burnt as well?
/dev/random
What he is saying is: Even if it were possible for us to pump enough CO2 into the atmosphere to trigger a runaway greenhouse, long before that would happen there would be no humans left to actually do it. We would have killed ourselves -- but not the planet.
And therein lies my argument: The real-world consequences of climate change are grave enough. We do not need to worry about the fictional ones. The fictional ones only benefit the climate change deniers who can decry them as "fearmongering".
NB
Isn't the mini-runawy described by Hansen a reason for worry? Isn't the fact that all the bio-mass will be burnt along with the fossil fuels a reason for worry?
/dev/random
No. These are theoretical scenarios. Again, the planet would be inhabitable for humans long before that happens. And even long before that, the planet would be inhospitable, with the resulting extreme social and economic consequences. That is what we need to worry about.
Plain and simple: We do not need to worry about dying from boiling oceans, we need to worry about not starving and not being able to breathe outside.
1glenn
I read an article in Scientific American magazine, decades ago, about how the authors think Venus went from having surface water, to being what it is today, in a period of time that is short by some standards. The authors posited that Venus could have completely changed in as little as 200,000 years.
Not a pleasant thing to contemplate. Not that I think it will happen here on Earth. Our current problems are man made, and at some point people will demand corrective action, if we do not take the necessary steps before things get too intolerable.
On a side note......a neighbor, a good friend and a Trump supporter, insisted to me the other day that things are getting hotter because the Earth has moved closer to the Sun. Sometimes I will try to discuss these things with him, but that day I just didn't have the energy.
GuruMick
In 1981 Hansen wrote of carbon dioxide and global warming correlation.
I believe the time for doubt has passed.
NB
Not being worried in the face of danger, and denying the danger, is not a sign of wisdom.
theFu
That statement is incorrect. To the contrary, life on Earth will end, if it survives all other ways that will likely end it first, in 2B years due to a runway greenhouse effect as our sun transitions towards a red giant and burns the oceans into the atmosphere, greatly increasing the greenhouse effect beyond the runaway point. This is physics and has been predicted scientists, except the crackpots.
In about 4B years, the size of the sun will expand beyond the current orbit of Earth, so while life will have all been killed off 2B years before (due to a super greenhouse effect), the Earth will become fuel for the sun ... or ejected. My money as a rocket scientist is on the Earth being eaten rapidly due to the solar atmosphere causing drag on the Earth's orbit.
ref: https://www.quantamagazine.org/new-clues-for-what-will-happen-when-the-sun-eats-the-earth-20231220
But whether the Earth is swallowed or ejected doesn't really matter. All life on Earth will be dead, dead, dead. This is why we need to get to other stars ASAP. Life that exists only around a single star will have a lifespan no longer than about 65% the life of the star itself, while the star is relatively calm.
I wasn't trying to scare people living today. We will never see this. "highly speculative" "not anywhere near that" and "really no evidenced for that AT THIS TIME" ... but in the article, they did say that only recently were SGE realized to exist and they are getting larger over time as more and more heat causes more evaporation in equatorial regions. They don't know, but have been watching it for about 8 yrs. Climate changes require decades to be seen.
NB
theFu, talking about what will happen in 4B years, instead of about what will happan in half a year, is a distraction.
/dev/random
You are right, I should have been more clear. What I and NB are so heavily disagreeing about is whether the runaway greenhouse is possible to be triggered by anthropogenic emissions. I, and current scientific opinion including by those who theorized the issue in the first place, say no. NB seems to think, yes, "in half a year".
NB
Not precise. James Hansen theorised the possibility of a mini-runaway, even without taking into account the burning down of the bio-mass.
/dev/random
You think I don't know that? You are quoting the source I gave to you back at me.
A "mini-runaway" (a term invented by Hansen) is, by his own definition, not a runaway greenhouse, it is a hyperthermal event. Hansen even quotes the PETM as such a "mini-runaway".
I hope we can at least agree that, evidently, Earth has not boiled off all of its water during the Palocene.
NB
Right.
theFu
Talking climate change for anything in less than 10 year spans, that's just crazy. 50-100+ yrs are needed, The science isn't THAT precise.
I won't live to see most of the terrible, predicted changes by 90% of climatologist, in the next 50 yrs. That doesn't mean they won't happen to others. These predictions all have error bars. Usually those are simplified to the "most likely", which is a judgement call or a simple middle-point in the error bars.
Where I work, we say, plan for the worst and hope for the best outcomes. Isn't that what everyone does who isn't politically motivated?