Displaying items by tag: coping with extreme heat

An area of high pressure lingered in the upper atmosphere over the U.S. Midwest and Northeast in June 2024. This pushed warm air toward the surface and trapped it there—a weather phenomenon meteorologists call a heat dome. The heat wave reached the Southern Appalachians, as seen in this model generated from NASA Earth Observatory data.  NASA

How climate change is heating up the weather, and what we can do about it

This article was originally published by The Conversation.

The heat wave that left more than 100 million people sweating across the eastern U.S. in June 2024 hit so fast and was so extreme that forecasters warned a flash drought could follow across wide parts of the region.

Prolonged high temperatures can quickly dry soils, triggering a rapid onset drought that can affect agriculture, water resources and energy supplies. Many regions under the June heat dome quickly developed abnormally dry conditions.

(The average temperature of June was about 7 degrees above normal in Knoxville as reported by Weather Underground).

The human impacts of the heat wave have also been widespread. In Ohio and Pennsylvania, emergency room visits for heat-related illnesses surged. Several Massachusetts schools without air conditioning closed to protect kids and teachers. In New York and New Jersey, electric wires sagged in the heat, shutting down trains into and out of New York City and leaving commuters stranded.