New “historic” temperature records, caused by a heat dome of extremely rare intensity, in western Canada and the United States. “The hottest temperatures of the historic heat wave underway are expected today across the Pacific Northwest,” warned the US National Weather Service (NWS).
This heat wave is explained by a phenomenon called “heat dome” : high pressures trap warm air in the area. This arouses “serious” health concerns, points out David Phillips, Chief Climatologist, Environment Canada. Especially since it has lasted for several days.
The intensity of this “heat dome” is “so statistically rare that one might only expectonce every few thousand years on average“, wrote the weather specialists of the Washington Post, the Capital Weather Gang. “But human-induced climate change has made these kinds of exceptional events more likely.”
“A dangerous and historic heat wave”
In western Canada, temperature records were set over the weekend in British Columbia, as far as the Whistler ski resort. In Lytton, a village northeast of Vancouver, the mercury soared to 46.6 degrees Celsius. The highest temperature ever recorded in Canada was previously 45 degrees in 1937.
Cities have opened refreshment centers, while stores are currently out of stock of fans and air conditioners. Vaccination campaigns against Covid-19 have also been canceled, and schools have closed.
“A prolonged, dangerous and historic heat wave will persist through this week, “Environment Canada warned. It has issued alerts for British Columbia, Alberta and parts of Saskatchewan, the Northwest Territories and the Yukon, bordering the United States. ‘Alaska. “We are the second coldest country in the world and the snowiest, “unaccustomed to this” desert heat, very dry, “said David Phillips on Monday.
“I feel like I’m in the desert”
Across the border, Americans are also being hit by sweltering temperatures in the northwestern states. This day “will probably go down in history as the hottest day on record “in Seattle, Wash., or Portland, Oregon, where records date back to the 1940s, the NWS wrote on Monday.
“This level of heat is extremely dangerous,” he warned. “I feel like I’m in the desert”, testified Sunday a resident of Seattle, day when the thermometer reached 40 degrees Celsius. In the town of Eugene, the last events of the American Olympic athletics selections have thus been postponed Sunday evening.
— .
