Las Vegas eyes record fifth consecutive day over 46C

Used to shrugging off the heat, Las Vegas residents were now eyeing the thermometer as the desert citywass on track to to set a record Wednesday (local time) for the most consecutive days over 46.1 Celsius amid a lingering hot spell that would continue scorching much of the US into the weekend.

On Tuesday, Las Vegas flirted again with the all-time temperature record of 48.8C reached on Sunday, but settled for a new daily mark of 48.3C that smashed the old one of 46.6C set for the date in 2021. Forecasters said the city would likely hit a record fifth straight day above 46.1C on Wednesday.

Even by desert standards, the prolonged baking that Nevada’s largest city was experiencing was nearly unprecedented.

“This is the most extreme heat wave in the history of record-keeping in Las Vegas since 1937,” said meteorologist John Adair, a veteran of three decades at the National Weather Service office in southern Nevada.

Tuesday's high temperature tied the mark of four straight days above 46.1C set in July 2005. And Adair said the record could be extended through Friday.

Alyse Sobosan said this July has been the hottest in the 15 years she has lived in Las Vegas. A counsellor at a charter school that was on summer break, Sobosan said she doesn’t step outside during the day if she could help it, and waited until 9pm or later to walk her dogs.

“It’s oppressively hot,” she said. “It’s like you can’t really live your life.”

It was also dangerously hot, health officials emphasised.

“Even people of average age who are seemingly healthy can suffer heat illness when it’s so hot its hard for your body to cool down,” said Alexis Brignola, an epidemiologist at the Southern Nevada Health District.

The searing heat wave gripping large parts of the US also led to record daily high temperatures in Oregon, where it was suspected to have caused six deaths, the state medical examiner’s office said Tuesday. More than 161 million people around the US were under heat alerts Tuesday, especially in Western states.

Dozens of locations across the West tied or broke previous heat records over the weekend and were expected to keep doing so all week.

The heat was blamed for a motorcyclist’s death over the weekend in Death Valley National Park. At Death Valley on Tuesday, tourists queued for photos in front of a giant thermometer that was reading 48.9C.

Simon Pell and Lisa Gregory from London left their air-conditioned RV to experience a mid-day blast of heat that would be unthinkable back home.

“I don't need a thermometer to tell me that it's hot,” Pell said. “You hear about it in stories and and wildlife documentaries. But just for me, I wanted to experience what it would feel like. ... It's an incredible experience.”

Death Valley was considered one of the most extreme environments in the world. The hottest temperature ever officially recorded on Earth was 56.67C in July 1913 in Death Valley, although some experts disputed that measurement and said the real record was 54.4C, recorded there in July 2021.

Record highs for the date were also hit Tuesday in parts of Oregon and Washington, with Portland reaching 39.4C and Salem and Eugene hitting 40.5C. Triple digit temperatures were also recorded in Idaho.

Phoenix, which has averaged the hottest temperature ever for the first eight days of July in records dating to 1885, tied the daily record Tuesday of 46.6 set in 1958.

The high Tuesday of 41.1C in Reno, Nevada, broke the daily record of 40C last tied in 2017 and extended to four days the longest streak ever of 40.5C or higher. Before this week, at an elevation of 1372 metres, the city had never been that hot for more than two consecutive days in records dating to 1888.

The US heat wave came as the global temperature in June was a record warm for the 13th straight month and marked the 12th straight month that the world was 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial times, the European climate service Copernicus said. Most of this heat, trapped by human-caused climate change, is from long-term warming from greenhouse gases emitted by the burning of coal, oil and natural gas, scientists say.

In Las Vegas, hotels and casinos keep their visitors cool with massive AC units. But for homeless residents and others without access to safe environments, officials have set up emergency cooling centres at community centres across southern Nevada.

Firefighters in Henderson, Nevada, last week became the first in the region to deploy what city spokesperson Madeleine Skains called “polar pods” used to cool a person exhibiting symptoms of heat stroke or a related medical emergency.

Skains said four vehicles, including battalion chiefs in the city of more than 330,000 residents have the devices that are similar to units first put into use a month ago in Phoenix. They can be filled with water and ice to immerse a medical patient in cold water on the way to a hospital.

Extreme heat and a longstanding drought in the West has also dried out vegetation that fuels wildfires.

A new blaze in Oregon, dubbed the Larch Creek Fire, quickly grew to more than 12 square kilometres Tuesday evening as flames tore through grassland in Wasco County. Evacuations were ordered for remote homes about 24 kilometres south of The Dalles.

In California, firefighters were battling least 18 wildfires Tuesday, including a 109-square-kilometre blaze that prompted evacuation orders for about 200 residences in the mountains of Santa Barbara County. The Lake Fire was only 16% contained, and forecasters warned of a “volatile combination” of high heat, low humidity and northwest winds developing late in the day.

Northeast of Los Angeles, the 5-square-kilometre Vista Fire chewed through trees in the San Bernardino National Forest and sent up a huge plume of smoke visible across the region.

The National Weather Service said it was extending the excessive heat warnings across most of the Southwest US through Saturday morning.

“It's not over yet,” the service in Reno said.

Disclaimer: The copyright of this article belongs to the original author. Reposting this article is solely for the purpose of information dissemination and does not constitute any investment advice. If there is any infringement, please contact us immediately. We will make corrections or deletions as necessary. Thank you.