Death Valley Hits 130 Degrees as Heat Wave Sweeps
the West
Temperatures were broiling from Utah to California as
another “heat dome” led Western states to set up cooling centers and issue
motel vouchers.
By Matt
Craig and Sophie Kasakove
July 10,
2021
FURNACE CREEK,
Calif. — For Gary Bryant, the tenth-of-a-mile walk from his modular home to the
air-conditioned restaurant where he was working on Saturday was “quite enough”
time outside.
Mr. Bryant,
64, knows the risks of summer temperatures in Death Valley. He once collapsed
under a palm tree from heat exhaustion and had to crawl toward a hose spigot to
douse himself with water.
Mr. Bryant
has lived and worked in Death Valley for 30 years, happy to balance the brutal
summer heat with the soaring mountain vistas, but even he admits that the high
temperatures in recent years were testing his limits. The temperature soared to
130 degrees on both Friday and Saturday and was forecast to hit the same peak
on Sunday.
“The first
20 summers were a breeze,” he said. “The last 10 have been a little bit
tougher.”
The
blistering weekend heat, one of the highest temperatures ever recorded on
Earth, matched a similar level from August 2020. Those readings could set
records if verified, as an earlier record of 134 degrees in 1913 has been
disputed by scientists.
Much of the
West is facing further record-breaking temperatures over the coming days, with
over 31 million people in areas under excessive heat warnings or heat
advisories. It is the third heat wave to sweep the region this summer.
The extreme
temperatures that scorched the Pacific Northwest in late June led to nearly 200
deaths in Oregon and Washington State as people struggled to keep cool in
poorly air-conditioned homes, on the street and in fields and warehouses.
The same
“heat dome” effect that enveloped the Northwest — in which hot, dry ground
traps heat and accelerates rising temperatures — has descended on California
and parts of the Southwest this weekend.
Sarah
Rogowski, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said that daytime
highs between 100 and 120 degrees were hitting parts of California. Most
dangerously, temperatures will remain high into the night, hovering 15 to 25
degrees above average.
“When you
start getting those warm temperatures overnight combined with those high
temperatures during the day, it really starts to build the effect,” Ms.
Rogowski said. “People aren’t able to cool off; it’s a lot harder to get
relief.”
She said
forecasters were also monitoring looming thunderstorms that could bring
lightning strikes and fire risk. Already on Friday, lightning set off a
fast-moving fire north of Lake Tahoe, prompting evacuations in California and
Nevada, road closures and the partial closure of the Plumas National Forest.
The fire
had doubled in size by Saturday as firefighters struggled to contain it.
Evacuation orders were also issued in southern Oregon in response to
fast-spreading fires there.
The
record-shattering temperatures in the Pacific Northwest last week would have
been all but impossible without climate change, according to a team of climate
researchers. Because climate change has raised baseline temperatures nearly two
degrees Fahrenheit on average since 1900, heat waves are likely to be hotter
and deadlier than those in past centuries, scientists said.
Excessive-heat
warnings blanket most of California, along with parts of Nevada, Arizona, Utah,
Oregon and Idaho.
California
is facing the most extreme and widespread high temperatures. The agency that
runs the state’s electrical grid, the California Independent System Operator,
issued pleas on Thursday for consumers to cut back on power use to help prevent
blackouts. Gov. Gavin Newsom asked residents to cut their water consumption by
15 percent as he expanded a regional drought emergency to cover all but eight
of the state’s 58 counties.
The city of
Merced reached 111 degrees on Saturday, breaking the record of 108 set in 1961.
Records could be broken this weekend in Fresno, Madera, Hanford and
Bakersfield.
Cities and
towns across the state’s Central Valley activated cooling centers and temporary
housing on Friday.
The city of
Sacramento opened three cooling centers and provided motel vouchers to families
with small children and older people who had no regular housing.
It was the
third time this summer that the city had activated cooling centers, said Daniel
Bowers, the city’s director of emergency management. Last summer, Sacramento
activated cooling centers only three times during the entire season — the third
time was not until September.
This year,
the city started its heat response early when a heat wave pounded much of
Northern California over Memorial Day weekend.
“That was
kind of an eye-opener of how the summer was going to go,” Mr. Bowers said. With
its fair share of practice in recent years, he said, the city is well prepared
for the weekend temperatures. But the high nighttime temperatures pose
particular risks to people who are homeless, he said.
Further
down the valley in Modesto, which had a high of 108 degrees on Saturday, the
Salvation Army said it had seen an uptick in people seeking shelter.
The shelter
is “seeing individuals we normally wouldn’t see — normally people that are OK
being in their tents, they’re OK sleeping outside,” said Virginia Carney, the
shelter director.
Terri
Castle, who has been staying at the Modesto shelter for the past month, said
she had spent previous summers living on the street and was worried for people
who did not have a place to cool off this weekend.
“When
you’re homeless, you’re already out in the weather 24/7,” Ms. Castle said. “And
when the sun hits you, it’s hard to find anywhere for shade. You can’t get
enough water.” Over her few weeks at the shelter, she said, she has noticed a
surge in people seeking relief from the heat.
One man was
taken from the shelter by ambulance on Thursday after experiencing heat-related
illness. A woman who came seeking water and food “just sat down outside and
looked so hot, like she had no energy,” Ms. Castle said.
In Death
Valley, the high of 134 degrees recorded in 1913 had been recognized as the
hottest temperature ever recorded on the planet. But a 2016 analysis by
Christopher Burt, a weather expert, found that the recording was inconsistent
with other regional observations, leading him to dispute whether the record was
“possible from a meteorological perspective.”
In any
case, the recent sweltering temperatures have prompted their own form of
tourism. As the number creeps toward 130, people begin lining up to take photos
next to the digital thermometer outside the Furnace Creek Visitor Center.
Even on
Saturday, when morning temperatures were hovering close to 110 degrees, park
visitors could be found playing golf, swimming and hiking in the early morning
hours.
Ashley
Dehetre, 22, and Katelyn Price, 21, descended into Badwater Basin around 9 a.m.
with cooling towels around their necks and three liters of water strapped to
each of their backs. Their 33-hour road trip from Detroit and the triple-digit
temperatures have done little to dampen their spirits, even after a worried
phone call from Ms. Price’s mother revealed that the temperature back home was
66 degrees.
“This view
in itself is so awesome, it’s worth it,” Ms. Dehetre said. “So much better than
Michigan.”
Zooming
past them on the salt flats was Tyler Lowey, who drove overnight from Los
Angeles to celebrate his 25th birthday by running 25 miles at the basin, which
is the lowest point in North America. The challenge was part of a yearlong set
of adventures he was attempting, including biking across the country from Los
Angeles to Miami next month. To prepare, he packed his car with plenty of
water, amino acid powders and fresh coconuts, which in his time as a personal
chef he has found to be the best at combating heat-related fatigue.
Still,
after just a mile out and a mile back, he was drenched in sweat and ready to
take a break and cool down in his car.
“The heat
sucks,” he said. “But I kind of want to bang it out, because the longer I wait,
the hotter it’s going to be.”
High up on
Zabriskie Point at sunrise, Anshuman Bapna, 42, took in the heat with a bit
more reserve. As the founder of a climate change educational platform, he felt
compelled to detour his family’s trip, planned from Palo Alto, Calif., to Zion
National Park, through Death Valley in order to experience the extreme
conditions.
“Heat waves
like this are just going to become even more common,” he said. “There’s a bit
of a ‘see what you can’ before the world changes.”
Sophie
Kasakove is a 2021-2022 reporting fellow for the National desk. @sophie_kasakove
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