A dangerously hot summer is looming in the US West with heat suspected in dozens of recent deaths, including retirees in Oregon and a motorcyclist dying in Death Valley, California and a 10-year-old boy who fell collapsed while hiking with his family on a trail in Phoenix.
The nation’s top weather-related cause of death is heat. However, since counties use different methods to enumerate such helot deaths and investigations into suspected heat fatalities can take months at times, it is not clear how many people died during the recent heat wave that started on July 1.
There are signs it was an especially lethal two weeks.
“This is just a harbinger of things to come,” said Joellen Russell, a climate scientist at the University of Arizona in Tucson on Friday. “The floods, droughts, wildfires, heat waves, hurricanes, thunderstorms: We have activated all this extreme weather with the extra carbon dioxide we put into the atmosphere.”
Here are some things to know:
Where most deaths occurred Nineteen deaths are being investigated for possible heat-related causes in Northern California’s Santa Clara County where temperatures hit triple digits this month due to excessive heat. Four people who died were homeless and nine were more than 65 years old according to the medical examiner’s office.
In Oregon record high temperatures killed at least sixteen people mostly around Metro Portland area
This year has seen confirmed cases for nine deaths related to over-heating according to Clark County Coroner’s Office that encompasses Las Vegas.
Some young children have been investigated for dying recently including a 2-years old girl who was left alone inside a hot car outside Tucson also another one was boat ill on Lake Havasu.
How hot it has been Throughout this month so far there have been broken records for high temperatures across western states with Palm Springs (California) hitting its all-time high when it reached 124°Fahrenheit (51.1°Celsius) on July 5th and Las Vegas reaching its all-time high of 120°F (48.8°C) on July 7th.
During the recent heat wave, Las Vegas had a record seven consecutive days where the temperature reached 115°F or higher, almost twice the previous mark of four consecutive days set in July 2005, revealed the National Weather Service. So far since June 1st, that city has broken eighteen different heat records at least.
According to the National Weather Service, California’s Death Valley observed a high of 129° F (53.8 °C) on July 7thmatching the daily record established in 2007. On Wednesday, Phoenix heated up to a high of 115° F (46.1°C), tying with temperatures recorded on this day in both 1958 and1934.
For five straight days ending last Tuesday Portland Oregon saw new daily heat records; with temperatures hitting 104°F (40°C).
Why the death toll is uncertain The numbers of people who died from excessive heat are not known as jurisdictions have varying methods of calculating such deaths. Still some counties do better than most other parts within county in southwestern USA.
Heat-related deaths in Pima County, Arizona’s second most populous county and which houses Tucson, were last year incorporated into a new online dashboard. The heat-related deaths have been counted in Maricopa County, the hottest big city in America where Phoenix is found. Also Clark County, Nevada, home to Las Vegas tracks fatalities that are due to heat.
However, it is not uniform across jurisdictions how heat related deaths are counted. Death investigations in some places are conducted by a forensic pathologist who usually is a medical examiner. In other parts of the country the office of coroner can be elected such as Orange County California whose coroner happens to be an elected sheriff. In some of the small counties within Texas cause of death may be determined by a justice of peace.
Besides, CDC numbers are often behind by several years in reporting and provide an incomplete picture because they rely on data from local, state, tribal and territorial death certificate information.
An analysis this year per CDC data shows over 2,300 people who died in the US last summer mentioned effects of excessive heat on their death certificate making it the highest number recorded since such records started being kept 45 years ago. But doctors say this represents just a fraction of actual fatalities due to extreme temperatures.
Why confirmation lags It can take pathologists months in some cases to determine if a death was heat-related.
Unlike a suicide by hanging or homicide caused by a bullet through one’s head not all heat related deaths can easily be established as such; sometimes it takes weeks or even months for toxicological tests to identify whether heat played any role at all.
For instance when there has been no refrigeration for days after death body is discovered inside hot apartment there remain so many unknowns for investigators. Even though it could have been really hot when he/she was found we cannot tell how hot it was within since when death took place inside any residence whatsoever.
It also takes quite a while for toxicological tests to identify substance use such as alcohol or street drugs.
As a result, Maricopa County’s Public Health Department did not release its final count of 645 heat-related deaths during springtime until this year. Because they also included those where heat was secondary cause for death like heart attack etcetera which happens when it is hot.
The forecast The temperatures in Portland Oregon have cooled off but were expected to warm slightly during the weekend peaking in the low 90s extending south into eugene and Salem.
The National Weather Service in Phoenix said an excessive heat warning was forecast to continue through Saturday, with highs at 111 F (43.8 C) before dropping below 110 F (43.3 C) on Sunday and next week.
Las Vegas would see slightly cooler weather through the weekend after spending ten days under an excessive heat warning. However, next week’s highs will be above normal hitting between 110 and 112 F (43.3-44.4 C), according to the National Weather Service.
And summer isn’t over yet.
