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Phoenix – Large parts of the American West were hit by scorching heat this week as a high pressure dome combined with the worst drought in modern history to shoot temperatures into triple digits, beating records even before the official start of summer.
Record daily highs were seen this week in parts of Arizona, California, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and Utah. Phoenix, which is baking in some of the hottest weather in the western United States, hit a record high of 118 degrees (48 degrees Celsius) on Thursday and was forecast to hit 116 degrees (46 degrees Celsius) on Friday and Saturday.
“Very dangerous temperatures should continue to break today’s record across deserts with highs well above normal levels,” National Weather Service Phoenix staff wrote on Facebook. “Very good day to stay indoors.”
Why is the American West so hot this week?
The heat is coming from the high pressure system over the west, said Marvin Bersha, the agency’s chief meteorologist in Phoenix, which is a clamp in the jet stream winds that move across the United States, sucking up vast tracts of dry soil due to a historic drought.
He and other scientists say the heat wave is unusual because it arrives earlier and lasts longer than in most years.
“In June last year, things looked very normal,” noted Park Williams, of the University of California, Los Angeles, a climate and fire scientist. “The record-breaking heat waves came in August and September.”
But with this early heat wave this year, “this could be the tip of the iceberg,” Williams said.
What roles do drought and climate change play?
A two-decade drought that some scientists refer to as a “mega drought” has sucked moisture from the soil over much of the western United States. In a study published last year in Science, researchers said that human-made climate change linked to greenhouse gas emissions could be responsible for about half of historical droughts.
Scientists who studied the drought that began in 2000 studied an area of nine states from Oregon and Wyoming down through California and New Mexico and found another area slightly larger. This drought began in 1575, a decade after the founding of St. Augustine, Florida and before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620.
Hot weather can be linked to drought drying out the landscape. Normally some of the sun’s heat evaporates moisture in the soil, but scientists say western soils are so dry that this energy makes the air warmer instead.
“When the soil is wet, the heat waves aren’t so bad,” said Williams, who calculated that the soil in the western half of the country is the driest since 1895. risk.”
How do the recent wildfires show up in this?
Scientists say the wildfires that have broken out in recent days have been fueled by excessive heat across the region. Climate change contributes to drought conditions and increases the potential for trees and shrubs to catch fire.
At least 14 new fires broke out this week in Montana and Wyoming as record heat set off an early start to the fire season. Firefighters also battled fires in Arizona and New Mexico.
“From a fire potential standpoint, what’s capable this year is certainly more dangerous than we’ve seen in the past,” USDA meteorologist Gina Palma said in a climate briefing Thursday.
Palma said drought-related fire risks have been particularly evident at higher elevations across much of the western United States, from the Rocky Mountains to the southwest and parts of California.
“You’re going to have very intense fires, certainly conditions that we wouldn’t normally see in June,” she said.
A thermometer display shows a temperature of 130 degrees Fahrenheit at the Furnace Creek Visitor Center in Death Valley National Park on June 17, 2021 in Furnace Creek, CA Patrick T. Fallon/AFP – Getty Images Is this the new normal?
A growing number of scientific studies are finding that heat waves in some cases can be directly attributed to climate change, said Kristi L. Ibe, a professor at the University of Washington’s Center for Global Health and Environment.
This means the American West and the rest of the world can expect more extreme heat waves in the future unless officials act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Ibe and other scientists say.
Last month’s study estimated the percentage and number of heat deaths each year that could be attributed to human-caused climate change. It included about 200 US cities and found more than 1,100 heat deaths annually from climate change, which represents about 35% of all heat deaths in the country.
On average each year, Phoenix has 23 heat-related deaths from the climate, Los Angeles 21 and Tucson 13, the study said.
“Climate change is hurting us now,” said Ibe. “It’s a future problem, but it’s also a current problem.”
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