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Temperatures up to 112 degrees broke records in Texas on Saturday, causing a prolonged heat wave that will spread to much of the central United States.
Parts of Texas could see record-breaking heat over the next six days, while record temperatures close to 90 degrees could extend as far north as the Great Lakes by Thursday.
This is the first heat wave of 2022 in the lower 48 states, at a time when people are not yet accustomed to hot weather, which increases the risk of heat-related diseases. The National Weather Service issued heat recommendations for parts of Central and South Texas on Sunday. They will probably have to be reissued and expanded to the north and east in the coming days.
“If you have plans outdoors, don’t forget to practice thermal safety and stay hydrated,” tweeted the Meteorological Office in Austin and San Antonio early Sunday.
The heat will also exacerbate the threat of critical to extreme fires that stretches from New Mexico to West Texas.
A “potentially historic” fire threatens New Mexico, southwest
Abnormally hot weather scorched not only Texas on Saturday. Scorching temperatures in the 1990s also spread to parts of Colorado and New Mexico. In Arizona, Phoenix reached its centenary for the first time this year.
Here is a list of some of the notable records set on Saturday:
- 107 degrees: Abilene, Del Rio and San Angelo, Texas.
- 106 degrees: Childress, Tex.
- 102 degrees: Lubbock, Tex.
- 101 degrees: San Antonio and Amarillo, Texas – the earliest recorded date, reaching the age limit in Amarillo.
- 98 degrees: Dalhart, Texas.
- 96 degrees: Corpus Christi, Texas.
- 91 degrees: Colorado Springs.
- 89 degrees: Denver.
- 87 degrees: Galveston, Texas.
The mercury rose to 112 degrees in the village of Rio Grande near the Mexican border in West Texas, according to Maximiliano Herrera, an expert on extreme weather conditions.
While not related to the heat in Texas and southwest, South Florida also baked on Saturday, with record levels in Miami (93, 2021 draw) and Fort Lauderdale (93).
Heat until swollen to the north and northeast
On Sunday, the record heat – with temperatures again above 100 – will be concentrated mainly in Texas before the high-pressure dome, responsible for hot air balloons to the Great Lakes, as the week continues.
Record highs to the 1990s are expected in Louisiana, central and southern Arkansas and western Mississippi on Monday.
By Tuesday, record highs to the low-1990s will extend all the way north to St. Louis. The St. Louis Meteorological Office wrote that the weather model would be “unusually warm air mass that would bring several days of surface temperatures approaching daily records for early May.”
The heat will be highest on Wednesday, with highs close to 90 or more in Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois and throughout the south. The Meteorological Service predicts that dozens of records will be broken.
The record-breaking heat will spread farthest north until Thursday, when Minneapolis could reach 90, while the high to 80 reaches Michigan and Wisconsin.
Chicago can see peaks near or above 90 from Tuesday to Thursday, flirting with records every day. “The extended forecast period includes the much-advertised first multi-day period of hot and gloomy conditions for the year,” wrote the Chicago office of the meteorological service.
Although humidity levels will not be as depressing as they would be in mid-summer, dew points in the mid-60s to near 70 will make the air temperature feel a few degrees higher.
The cooler air coming from the northwest will crush the heat core back in Texas and parts of the south on Friday and the weekend.
This early heat wave in the central states promises to be the first of many. The weather service’s summer temperature forecast tends to be above normal for much of the lower 48 states. In addition, man-made climate change increases the likelihood of more frequent, intense and prolonged heat waves.
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