Over the days of 25 June - 29 June 2021, there was extreme heat in western North America
The US states of Washington and Oregon, as well as the Canadian Province of British Columbia, all achieved all time record maximum temperatures.
An unofficial list of all the new all time record maximum temperatures in this event, courtesy of the "coolwx" website run by Dr. Robert Hart of Florida State University, is shown later on this page.
Below is a commentary on this event. Many of the charts, below, come from a US list-serve.
COMMENTS ON LARGE SCALE FEATURES
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An unofficial list of all the new all time record maximum temperatures in this event, courtesy of the "coolwx" website run by Dr. Robert Hart of Florida State University:. Some of the new all time record temperatures are more than 8C greater than the previously highest temperature ever recorded at the sites.
SOCIETAL IMPACTS
WA, OR, and BC are all usually cool and cloudy. Houses are built with large, south facing windows, to maximize sunlight into houses. Less than half of houses have air conditioning. In short: WA, OR, and BC houses are all built to the past climatology of the area, and the heat they got was very far from that climatology. One approach taken was to board up windows. In contrast to an incoming tropical cyclone, in which the boarding up is to prevent glass from breaking, here, it was to block out the sun and try to keep in the cool air. Dale Durran, University of Washington: "One thing I did to prepare for the heat was buy some 4’x8’ sheets of 1/4” foam core and use them to block the direct sunlight in several windows. Below is a photo of one row of such blocked windows. I’m going to save these for really cold days too — they have to have an R value above most window coverings and work particularly well on the sloped glass."
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