Daily temperature records will tumble as sizzling early season heat from a summerlike heat dome sends thermometers skyrocketing into the triple digits in parts of California and the West this week.

The official start of summer is just a few weeks away, but it will feel like July in much of the West as temperatures climb 20 degrees or more above average, the highest temperatures of the year so far for many locations.

Excessive heat warnings are in effect for more than 17 million people in California, Nevada, Utah and Arizona this week. The warnings are the most extreme form of heat alert issued by the National Weather Service and are used when widespread, dangerous heat is expected.

The soaring temperatures are being caused by a heat dome, a large area of high pressure that parks over an area, traps air and heats it with abundant sunshine for days or weeks. The resulting heat becomes more intense the longer a heat dome lasts.

  • Venia Silente@lemm.ee
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    6 months ago

    US temperatures

    what… is that? Temperature is measured in Celsius. Maybe Kelvin if you want to be fancy or are doing really cool stuff with really cool states of matter.

    • hollunder
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      6 months ago

      Fahrenheit would like to have a word with you…

      • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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        6 months ago

        Fahrenheit is wrong. He just has over inflated opinion of himself.

        Who measures temperature according to what one person considers to be how all other humans feel is normal, was this ever independently verified? What an arbitrary temperature scale, what if I want to measure something that isn’t personal body heat, like, oh I don’t know, maybe some water?

        All in jest of course, but seriously it’s a terrible temperature scale and scientific consensus is to always use SI units.

      • Venia Silente@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        Escusé moi I don’t believe in fuhrers or fahrers or whatever the Germans are inventing these days.

        (alas, not completely sarcasm, but that’s the modern world for you.)