Welcome back to Weekly Wednesday Weather, bringing you interesting and original writing.
The big story this week? Heat!
HEATWAVE
There’s a major heatwave in the Southwest this week.
Heat gets underappreciated as a major weather hazard in many places, even places where it’s hot all the time. But you know it’s hot when even Phoenix and the Inland Empire of California have excessive heat warnings.
When it gets hot people die.
Not only do people die, there are other problems.
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Roads buckle and rails kink. You might think the roads are a solid structure—they aren’t. They are built in slabs and layers, like lots of layer cakes laid end to end, and they expand and contract with the temperature. Pavement relief joints are added to help release the stresses caused by expansion and contraction but sometimes they don’t always help. Sometimes the heat-buckling can be quite sudden and dramatic---bits of concrete explode all over the roadway. In addition, if it’s too hot, the asphalt used to pave the road can deform—ok, melt. The heat can be as stressful to maintenance budgets as the winter freeze-thaw cycle. And rail deformation can and does cause derailments. I suspect that’s what caused that oil train to derail in the Columbia Gorge a couple weeks ago.
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Planes cannot take off and land. Phoenix Sky Harbor is the airport generally most affected by this phenomenon. When it gets extremely hot, air becomes less dense. Aircraft need that density to create and maintain lift. Certain types of aircraft will have issues taking off and landing.
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Electrical demand—AC is energy hungry and if demand exceeds available supply---spikes can overload the delivery network, causing brownouts and blackouts.
But the big thing, arguably the most important, is the heat is deadly. Now I’m one who likes the heat and tolerates it fairly well. I’m generally not uncomfortable until the heat index is over 105, but I recognize that even I have limits. During the July 1993 heatwave in Philadelphia- a heatwave that took the lives of over 100 people, I was at a public pool when I suddenly did not feel well. I walked back to a relative’s house and was told to get in a cool bath immediately, and to take some aspirin. I also broke out in a rash everywhere. I had prickly heat rash and a touch of heat stroke.
I obviously recovered, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation, but that summer 113 others did not. Two summers later in Chicago 739 died in a 5-day heatwave.
We underestimate the heat—even I do it still although I’m careful to make sure I’m hydrated. Heat is by far the most lethal weather phenomenon. 70,000 died in Europe during the heatwave of 2003, 15,000 of them in France alone. On average the heat takes the lives of some 400 Americans every year. It disproportionally effects the elderly and urban poor the most. Social science studies indicate a confluence of factors come together to cause heatwaves to move from uncomfortable and unpleasant to deadly—for example one thing that came out about heatwaves is people 65 or older don’t always abide by heat emergency recommendations because they don’t consider themselves seniors. A 2014 study indicated that in the US, hot weekdays decrease economic productivity. Heatwaves are associated with an increase in violent crime, increased interpersonal conflict, and in unstable countries, civil wars. Look at Syria. The heat is what set that kindling ablaze—even though the region is one that is very hot to begin with.
Most cities in the US and Europe have made efforts to reduce heat-related deaths. But we need to look out for our neighbors—be the friendly face on your block. One reason people died in Chicago and Philadelphia was because they bought fans, but didn’t open windows. Doing this turns your house into a convection oven-like setting. They were scared of crime and their neighbors didn’t look out for them. Adaptations like cooling centers of refuge and responsive governments—even here in the dysfunctional US, help immensely, the horror of July 1993 and the summer of 1995 have not repeated in the US, and the 2006 European heatwave killed far, far fewer than the 2003 heatwave.
Finally, there’s the future. These heatwaves will become standard. It seems to me we can walk away from our rising seas since they’re doing so slowly enough. It’ll be the heat that will be the real killer.
Stay cool if you can, and look out for each other.
PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...
NEVER LEAVE KIDS OR PETS UNATTENDED IN CARS. DRINK MORE WATER
THAN USUAL AND AVOID ALCOHOL...SUGAR...AND CAFFEINE. WHEN
OUTDOORS...WEAR LIGHT COLORED CLOTHING AND A WIDE-BRIMMED HAT TO
KEEP YOUR HEAD AND BODY COOLER. TAKE FREQUENT REST BREAKS IN
SHADED OR AIR CONDITIONED ENVIRONMENTS. PUBLIC PLACES WITH AIR
CONDITIONING INCLUDE LIBRARIES...COMMUNITY CENTERS...GOVERNMENT
BUILDINGS...MALLS...AND SPECIAL REFUGE STATIONS.
RECOGNIZE THE SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS OF HEAT ILLNESS. EARLY SYMPTOMS
INCLUDE THINGS SUCH AS HEADACHE...THIRST...AND MUSCLE CRAMPS.
SERIOUS SYMPTOMS INCLUDE WEAKNESS...SKIN THAT IS COOL TO THE
TOUCH...FAST BUT WEAK PULSE...NAUSEA...AND FAINTING. SEVERE
SYMPTOMS INCLUDE HOT AND RED DRY SKIN...FAST AND STRONG PULSE...
SWEATING THAT HAS STOPPED...AND UNCONSCIOUSNESS. UNTREATED HEAT
ILLNESS CAN LEAD TO FATAL HEAT STROKE.
STAY COOL...STAY HYDRATED...STAY INFORMED.
TROPICS
The Atlantic is quiet for now, but modeling has been persistent for the weekend of July 4th that something might be in the Gulf of Mexico. When modeling is persistent, I pay attention. That said, modeling was persistent about developing something off the Southeast for this week too, and there ain’t nothin’ there, so take with a grain of salt. I like what this blog had to say.
VOLCANOES
Hekla is an Icelandic volcano. It erupts somewhat often—on average every 35 years, and once a decade since 1970. Its last eruption was in 2000, so…there’s some concern it may erupt again, perhaps explosively.
It’s sparked off the usual flurry of bad, ill-informed media around the world, mostly in the UK. This article is a nice rebuttal to those articles.
It’d be nice if the Earth’s processes worked on a predictable clock and we could predict exactly when a volcano would erupt, or an earthquake will happen, just like we can predict the weather with very good accuracy. We cannot, and with earthquakes, it may never become possible. Volcanoes certainly do give signs they’re about to erupt—another Icelandic volcano named Öræfajökull seems to be doing just that. Hekla actually doesn’t seem to be giving any sign, according to Dr. Klemetti and others, but that doesn’t mean anything when Hekla is a volcano whose eruptions happen very suddenly—again some volcanoes give years of warnings they’re about to blow (Mt. St. Helens, Pinatubo, Vesuvius), others, mere minutes. Hekla is in the latter category, in fact by the time this posts, Hekla could be putting on a show. Worth watching!
Speaking of volcanoes giving sign: Mauna Loa sure is. (Mauna Loa is in the “give years of warning” category.) I’d be surprised if Mauna Loa didn’t erupt sometime before 2022. BTW yes, we did drop bombs on a lava flow from a Mauna Loa eruption during WWII. No, those bombs did not end the eruption. This is a story you’ve likely heard.
Also if you’re not reading Volcanocafe on a regular basis, and its comments, you’re really, really missing out. One of the best science-blogs there is out there---with smart commenters too.
OFF TOPIC
2thanks is doing a really cool thing that deserves your eyes. They are doing a Community Transcript project. Please read and rec those diaries and if you can, donate. I think this is incredibly important.