We're having a heat wave...temperature was
107 degrees here in Claremont Monday – 122 record-setting degrees in Palm Springs,
California -- an hour auto drive east. The highest temperatures I recall experiencing were 115-116 a couple days years ago in Phoenix/Scottsdale, Arizona.
Hot days like even the lower temperatures we're having now generally didn't occur until three or four
weeks later in the year if we had them at all. Do you suppose this might be one more indicator of global warming and/or climate change? Is there any question!
Fires we don’t
usually experience until fall started, also, yesterday – in communities west
of where I live – ground growth, shrubs and trees are a tinderbox due to our
drought. The cause is thought to be due
to a car crash which led to a second fire with both continuing to spread
closer together for a massive out-of-control burn.
Driving
on an afternoon errand I could see the blue sky was being swallowed by
the darkening reddish brown smoky clouds moving toward our city which
they had reached by the time I arrived home. We're not threatened by
fire but the air pollution is unhealthy so I'll be staying indoors.
Cities
west, Asuza and Duarte (home of City of Hope Medical Center but not
reported as threatened) are the communities whose foothill residences
edge into the mountainsides burning. Evacuations of people,
animals...firefighters on the ground...helicopter water drops...planes
spreading fire retardants. Wild animals, including bears, deer, smaller
creatures... leaving the forests...fleeing to neighborhoods. So far no
homes lost. Concern the wind velocity might increase or direction
might change through the night.
The
electric power grid has been down in some other Los Angeles County
areas. One area's residents are reported to be enraged to be without
power due to a "planned outage" on this record-setting predicted hottest
day. Some resident's complain they didn't even get an advance notice
others report having been given. I can identify with their protests as
the same failure to notify me has happened twice in recent years. I
understand needed preventative work, but doing so on this specific day
doesn't make sense?
Other southwestern
states are being clobbered by similar drought effects. This is what we experience plus our
earthquakes much as other states are primarily subjected to tornadoes, massive
flooding, hurricanes, winter’s freezing snows.
Ella
Fitzgerald is one of my favorite jazz female vocalists who recorded this Irving
Berlin song with Enoch Light’s arrangement in 1958. This song was introduced in the 1933 musical
show As Thousands Cheer by Ethel Waters – the song subsequently was featured in
several movies and recorded by numerous singers.
Temperatures of 107, 115-116 and 122! I will never complain about 90 again. Fires are so scary. Thankfully, I live in an area where they aren't a common threat. No matter where you live, though, there are scary weather elements to endure. And endure we all must do.
ReplyDeleteI haven't heard that Ella song in years.
I think we get acclimated to weather as I had years living in snow country, but I don't tolerate the extremes, hot or cold, as well as I did when younger.
DeleteThis is not good news. One reason I enjoy living in the Pacific Northwest as opposed to Texas is the heat and everything brown and crisp bothers me a great deal. Feels like death. Here things are green making me think of life, living.
ReplyDeleteI can appreciate preferring the greenery, but have found the Southwest has a uniquely appealing beauty with its own life.
DeleteAnd up here in Oregon, the temps in my region (the Coast Range) are lower than usual. We were supposed to get some warmer days this week but it's clouded up; so not sure that's happening.
ReplyDeleteRight now I wouldn't mind having some of your weather.
DeleteElla got it right, and its scary. Yes its Climate Change and the question is "How hot can it get?" Al Gore knew it thirty years ago.
ReplyDeleteGuess we'll be finding out how hot. How much heat can we tolerate?
DeleteHigh temperatures and fires have been common in California, but in October, not in June! The temperatures were so high and the fires would burn so hot in the Santa Barbara area where my mother grew up, that the candles in the candlesticks on the fireplace in her house would fall over and melt.
DeleteYes, I'm mindful that fires this early does not bode well for the rest of the year. Heat to the degree of melting candles would be pretty hot.
ReplyDelete