How hot is it? Records that have stood for over 100 years are tumbling
Heat wave could relax a bit in the eastern US next week
Records to fall as sizzling heat blasts the Southern U.S.
Sizzling heat will be a mainstay in the Southeast and Southern Plains through the weekend where daytime highs will make a run at the century mark.
A heat wave has been baking the eastern two-thirds of the country for a couple of weeks now.
Triple-digit temperatures, or readings awfully close to that, have been the norm from the Plains to the Southeast and Midwest. Factor in the humidity, and the already-oppressive heat feels more like 110 degrees in some places.
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That relentless heat continues Friday, with heat alerts still in effect from Texas to southern Georgia and Florida. Record-high temperatures could be achieved in places such as San Antonio, Texas; Shreveport, Louisiana; and Orlando, Florida.
(FOX Weather)
What’s driving it is an expansive area of high pressure in the upper levels of the atmosphere that has parked itself across the south-central U.S. High-pressure systems force air to sink toward the surface. As the air is compressed, it heats.
Century-old records tied or tumbled
It’s been so hot during this scorching early summer that record-high temperatures that have stood for more than a century in some places have been broken. In other places, long-standing records have been tied.
Shane Brown, senior weather data specialist at FOX Weather, searched through daily record-high temperature reports that have been filed between June 16 and June 23.
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5 oldest broken record highs
Galveston, Texas, is at the top of this list with a 147-year-old record being shattered on June 19 when a high temperature of 97 degrees was recorded. The previous record high for that day was 95 degrees in 1875.
Houston came in second with a record high of 102 degrees on June 20. That eclipsed the previous record for the day of 101 degrees in 1902.
Here’s the full top-five list.
5 oldest tied record highs
Memphis, Tennessee, tied its record high on June 17 with a temperature of 100 degrees. That record was set in 1881.
Athens, Georgia, came in second on this list with a 111-year-old record of 100 degrees set in 1911 that was tied on June 16.
Here’s the full top-five list.
Relief in sight?
Forecast models show that the high-pressure system causing the current heat wave may relax a bit toward the middle of next week. However, those same models show the high being squeezed into the Northwest. That likely means that part of the U.S. will experience abnormally warm weather during that period.
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