PHOENIX − The city smashed is record for most consecutive days at 110 degrees or higher as a historic temperature inferno tightened its grip across much of the nation’s southern tier Wednesday.
Oppressive temperatures will spread across the south-central and southeast U.S. through this weekend, forecasters warned. And Phoenix can expect little relief: The National Weather Service warned that the “extremely dangerous and long-duration heat wave” will continue over the Southwest well into next week.
“This record is forecast to be obliterated,” AccuWeather Meteorologist Renee Duff said of the Phoenix streak. AccuWeather has 110-plus degree highs forecast daily through at least the middle to latter part of next week.
The dangerously hot temperatures are also taxing hospitals. At Valleywise Health Medical Center in some extreme cases, some patients were being cooled off in ice-packed body bags, Communications Director Michael Murphy told CNN.
“It doesn’t cool down here at all and surface temps can get so ridiculously high,” Murphy said.
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Climate change, El Niño conspire to bring the heat
The extreme temperatures being recorded this summer are the result of the combination of natural variations within the climate system and human-caused climate change, with a hefty serving of El Niño thrown in.
Daniel Swain, a climate scientist a the University of California, Los Angeles, says the world is starting to see the long-term, human-caused warming. Still, he doesn’t believe Earth has reached some sort of climate tipping point. This does not appear to be a sudden, sustained acceleration of the long-term trends climate scientists have been observing for decades, he said.
Still, “there aren’t any unprecedentedly extreme heat events on Earth that haven’t been exacerbated by climate change,” Swain said.
− Elizabeth Weise
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Texas heat brings call for air conditioning in prisons
Prison advocates, ministers, politicians and grieving parents are lobbying the Texas governor, lieutenant governor and Senate to put air conditioning in prisons as triple-digit temperatures transform them into a “living hell.” More than two-thirds of Texas’ 100 prisons do not have air conditioning in their living quarters, advocates say. Last month, nine people died of heart failure or unknown conditions, which advocates blame on the excessive heat in the prisons. Amanda Hernandez, Texas Department of Criminal Justice communications director, said preliminary findings show the deaths are “not heat related.”
However, J. Carlee Purdum, a Texas A&M University research assistant professor says the number reported is “wildly underestimated” because determining whether heat was the cause of death is difficult. Purdum said inmates described prisons during the summer as a “living hell.”
− Skye Seipp, Austin American-Statesman
Phoenix breaks 49-year heat record
Tuesday marked the 19 straight day with temperatures at or above 110 degrees in Phoenix, breaking a record set in 1974. The National Weather Service said the temperature at Sky Harbor International Airport ultimately reached 118 degrees, breaking a record for the date and tying for the highest temperature Phoenix has reached this year.
Temperatures are not expected to let up in Phoenix, and temperatures are forecast to be above 110 degrees for the remainder of the week. National Weather Service meteorologist Sean Benedict spoke on the causes of the current elevated temperatures in the area.
“We’re able to really heat up when we’re not having the moisture and the storms,” Benedict said. “We’re getting 5 to 10 degrees above normal in some cases.”
− Lorenzo Estrada and Fernando Cervantes Jr., Arizona Republic
Midwest, East could see life-threatening flooding
Flash flooding and severe weather are possible from the Midwest to the mid-Atlantic through Thursday, the weather service said. AccuWeather meteorologists stressed the risk of life-threatening and damaging flash flooding. During the past weekend, widespread rainfall of 1–4 inches and locally higher amounts from 6-8 inches in a matter of hours triggered rapid rises on small streams from Virginia to Maine. In some cases, streams spilled over roads and water rose across low-lying roadways in a matter of minutes.
Their was a silver lining: The storms were expected to move faster than the storms from last weekend and last week, which could help to mitigate a widespread flood threat, AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Adam Douty said.
“However, because of the saturated state of the ground in many areas due to the recent heavy rain … downpours can still trigger flash flooding more easily than would typically occur,” Douty warned.
USA TODAY
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