Los Angeles: A sweltering summer heat wave is expected to reach its peak on Thursday across much of the western United States.
Las Vegas is baking at 111 degrees Fahrenheit (44 degrees Celsius), while the mercury in Death Valley is expected to exceed 120 degrees Fahrenheit as a high-pressure system sweeps through the region.
Experts are warning that the unseasonably warm weather could herald the start of a harsh summer. In Las Vegas, dangerously hot temperatures have risen 10 to 15 degrees above average, and an extreme heat advisory has been extended through Saturday.
The cooling station opened up in the capital of desert gambling, and some events, like the farmer’s market, were forced to move indoors to avoid the furnace.
“One of the things that heats up quickly is that we really don’t have a chance to get used to the heat,” EMS director Glen Simpson told ABC’s Channel 13 in Las Vegas.
“Alserians are not used to it, even though they grew up here, they spend every summer here, their bodies are not used to it.”
California’s Central Valley is a large region known for its extensive agriculture, federal officials said.
Although temperatures should cool slightly in the coming days, a heat wave is expected to spread across northern Oregon and Washington on Sunday and Saturday.
A cold cloud from the Pacific Ocean, known locally as the June gloom, kept the temperature in the nation’s second largest city at 79F on Thursday.
An area of high pressure has swept across Mexico, drying up in a punishing heat wave.
Mexico City, which sits at 7,350 feet (2,240 meters) above sea level and usually enjoys mild weather, recorded its highest temperature late last month.
Officials say dozens of people have been killed and hundreds more injured by the heat wave that has ravaged the country. Experts say bad things can happen.
Francisco Estrada, coordinator of the Climate Change Research Program at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, said this year will be “the hottest year in history.”
Man-made climate change is warming the planet at an alarming rate, and the global scientific community agrees.
Humanity now faces an 80 percent chance that the Earth’s temperature will temporarily rise by at least 1.5 degrees Celsius, the United Nations predicted on Wednesday.
A report by the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Agency said last May was the hottest month on record, indicating human-caused climate change, prompting UN chief Antonio Guterres to compare humanity’s impact on the world to a “meteor”. exterminate the dinosaurs.”
Climate change causes extreme weather events, floods and droughts, rapid melting of glaciers and rising sea levels.
According to Copernicus, the European Union’s 23rd climate watchdog, 2023 is the hottest year yet. 2024 won’t be much better, with Pakistan, India and China already feeling the heat.
