Baked Apple: Heat wave hits urban northeast

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

By JIM FITZGERALD

NEW YORK (AP) - The urban Northeast baked like a potato wrapped in foil Friday as record-breaking, 100-degree temperatures and steambath humidity combined with the heat-trapping effects of asphalt and concrete to make millions of people miserable.

The mercury in Newark, N.J., reached 108, the highest temperature ever recorded in the city. Airports near Washington and Baltimore hit 105. Philadelphia reached 104, Boston 103, Portland, Maine, and Concord, N.H., 101 and Providence, R.I., 100. New York City hit 104 degrees, just 2 short of its all-time high, and with the oppressive humidity, it felt like 113.

Donald Demarque, a handyman, sat outside an auto repair shop in the broiling Bronx, waiting to get the air conditioner checked on his Nissan.

"It's only working at about half power," he said. "I think if it was a regular day I could put up with it, but not today. Today you don't want to have the car windows open."

Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20110722/D9OKVTOO1.html

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Vanity Mendez, 11, left, Isaiah Rivera, 6, center, and Jonathan Medina, 11, cool off at an open fire hydrant in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan, Thursday, July 21, 2011. A heatwave that has enveloped much of the central part of the country for the past couple of weeks is moving east and temperatures are expected to top the 100-degree mark. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

[lbrtbell]

1. This is par for the course in the desert southwest

It doesn't just "feel like" 113, it IS 113 and higher, for months. Even with low humidity, say 35%, the heat index at a temperature of 117 degrees makes it "feel like" 140. That's not counting how big cities like Vegas and Phoenix have FAR more concrete around than NYC ever will. And you don't even want to discuss getting into a car that's been parked in the desert sun.

It's tiresome, how New Yorkers think they're the only people in the world who have ever had a heat wave, or anything else, for that matter. If a tornado ever tore through the place, it would be The Biggest Tornado That Ever Hit Civilization Even If It Was Only An EF1!

I'm not unsympathetic about heat, just saying that New Yorkers need to get over themselves. It's merely one of MANY places getting fried this year.

[marasinghe]

4. don't go by the press scavengers. most New Yorkers are going about their regular lives.

this is just the media doing their usual chickenshit squawks over a zero.
the people being interviewed are similar to the types who emerge after a crime
& make inane & pointless comments to equally inane reporters;
like: "i always thought he, or, she, was strange".

plenty of NY folk, are originally from warm climates.
this heat is nothing - except, maybe, for the sick, or the old.
even New York pigeons are flying around - business as usual.

B-)

[DesertFlower]

8. my friend lives in new york. she's been

keeping me up to date on the temps.

[aquart]

21. Not remotely true.

This heat is the worst in my lifetime. Your ignorance is appalling.

Are people who have to work going to work? Yes. Is there anything normal about this? No.

Check the retail sales figures for this period. Nobody is taking a step they don't absolutely have to.

[freedom fighter jh]

6. In New York it's usually worse than it sounds.

I speak as an ex-New Yorker.

On the sidewalks in the business areas typically you walk in between a row of buildings whose cooling systems are spewing out hot air and a street full of cars that are spitting out hot exhaust. Then they tell you a temperature reading that comes from the top of a tower in idyllic, grassy Central Park. That reading does not reflect life on the street.

And in New York, unlike many places in 21st Century America, almost everyone walks and is forced to be exposed to the worst of it. There is no walking 10 feet to your car at one end and then parking your car at the other end and walking to 10 feet to the office. Almost everyone walks. Most days, that's a good thing.

And lots of people live without air conditioning. I did, in many different apartments, for 13 of the 16 years I lived there. Do you live without AC in the desert southwest?

Where I live now, today's high temperature was 105. The highest temperature I ever knew in New York was 102. 105 outdoors when I live and work in a comfortable environment is far, far better than 102 where I have to live in an apartment or walk on a street that's 102, or maybe hotter.

[DesertFlower]

9. the subways were like hell. by the

time i left in '89 most of the cars were air conditioned but the tunnels were not. i got my first air conditioner in 69. it was in my bedroom. if i turned on the iron or toaster the fuse blew. eventually things got better for us and we lived in an apartment that had 3 air conditioners.

[jwirr]

11. Anyone who has ever experience hot concrete know that it holds

the heat and adds to the temp also.

That is the one thing I remember about the movie "The Seven Year Itch" other than Marilyn Monroe. The whole story was based on these two people who are staying in the city instead of moving to the country during the hottest part of summer - thus Marilyn stands over the air rushing out of the grate in the sidewalk.

[boppers]

16. "Do you live without AC in the desert southwest?"

Yes. I grew up in it, while poor.

Swamp coolers, parking in the shade, rescheduling our days, living at night, towels on our steering wheels, planning walks based on "cooling spots", carrying water everywhere, eat "hot" foods (to sweat more), eat a high-sodium diet (salt runs out fast when sweating), choose footwear based on weather, wearing wicking clothing, covering skin (to reflect heat), avoid talking and mouth breathing (more moisture loss), etc.

Humans have lived there for 20,000 years without AC.

[aquart]

22. And it gets hotter at night in the apartments.

I have two air conditioners running set at 77. My apartment was 82 but went up to 85 at night. Just before dawn it dropped to 82 again and I got some sleep.

But my kitchen and bathroom have no heating or cooling at all. After working in the kitchen to make a salad yesterday, I had to spend the next three hours restoring my electrolyte balance I felt so sick.

[DesertFlower]

27. when i lived in new york i put an

air conditioner in the kitchen. just the heat from the refrigerator and the pilot light made it really hot.

[DesertFlower]

7. i'm a former new yorker. been living in

phoenix almost 22 years. our first summer here (1990) we hit 122.

i think it only takes an hour for the temperature inside a car parked in the sun to hit almost 200 degrees.

[sudopod]

12. Jesus, do want a hug or something? nt

[cali]

13. uh, sorry. dry heat is far more tolerable than humid heat. I've experienced both

Lived in Tucson for a summer, lived in D.C. for a summer. No question it was hotter in Tucson. No fucking question that it was far, far more oppressive in D.C. You sound utterly clueless.

[boppers]

17. It depends on what you're used to, I think.

I'm a native Tucsonan (30+ years). I spent a year in "Hotlanta".... I kind of liked not having to constantly re-hydrate, and having shade damn near everywhere in Hotlanta, and people not dropping from lack of water... it was balmy. (You know how to find an Arizonan in the south? They grow Kudzu.... for shade).

If I wasn't, as others have called me, "sand people", I might have hated Tucson heat more, because I didn't have a lifetime of behaviors ingrained into me about how to handle it.

I guess my point is thus:
People used to "wet heat" have a harder time in "dry heat", and vice versa.

[cali]

18. no again. I'm far more used to wet heat and I have a harder time in dry heat

and of course you have to constantly rehydrate in wet heat. Furthermore, people drop all the time in humid hot weather. Yesterday an 18 year old landscaper died in TN from the heat with a body temp of 110.

[DesertFlower]

29. been in phoenix almost 22 years. i adjusted

well to the dry climate. i feel the slightest bit of humidity now. my husband has adjusted to the summer heat. he wears long sleeves and doesn't break a sweat. i wear the least amount of clothing possible.

[aquart]

23. New Yorkers are NOT used to this.

Even the Florida native staying with my mom finally put on the air conditioning. And borrowed her car for a job interview instead of waiting outside for a bus.

[DesertFlower]

28. i agree. here in phoenix it can be 100 degrees

but with the low humidity and dewpoints it's not bad. now we're in the monsoon season. the dewpoints are up in the 60s making 108 uncomfortable. it will be like this till early or mid september.

i'd still rather be here than back in new york.

[Tx4obama]

2. Now the folks in the east know how we folks down here in Houston feel EVERY summer.

Last month we had 105 out at one of the airports one day, it didn't make big headlines.
And the number of days that we have 100 and 100+ degree heat are too many to count.

I do feel sorry for the folks that are not used to the heat and humidity, but in the end all I can say is "welcome to my world".

[iamjoy]

3. Yeah, But Do You Have Air Conditioning

I mean, I'm in Florida and most folks here have air conditioning. It's less common up north.

[CreekDog]

5. i don't think Houston has heat indexes of 120+

like Philly did today.

[cali]

14. Really? You actually think that people on the eastern seaboard don't know more than a little

about heat and humidity? How parochial of you.

[aquart]

24. Uh, this is why we don't want to live in Texas.

New York is in the temperate zone. Or it was.

[Gormy Cuss]

26. Your world is designed for that climate.

That's the difference that seems to get lost in threads like this. If Houston had days of subfreezing temperatures and a few feet of snow on the ground, you'd be pretty miserable.

[DesertFlower]

10. i asked my husband which he thinks is worse

phoenix or new york. he said "it's hot here but i've never gotten to work soaked like i did in new york". he drives to work. i remember walking from the subway to my office with the back of my shirt soaked.

of course there are people here who depend on buses to take them to work. it must be awful waiting for the bus and then of course there's the people who work outside. i don't know how they do it.

[cali]

15. It's not just people in NY and it's not just people working outside

I live in northern VT and it's been in the nineties for several days now. I work in a small kitchen with the oven going for hours. It's plenty hot.

[freedom fighter jh]

20. Yeah, but doesn't it cool down at night?

Some people I work with just came back from a trip to northern VT. They said it was dreadfully hot during the day, but at night they need *two blankets.*

In much of the rest of the country, the heat wave didn't give much relief at night, just a little.

[aquart]

25. NOT IN NYC. Apartments get HOTTER at night.

Vermont is a mountain state. New York is islands of asphalt.

[DesertFlower]

30. my condolences.

[boppers]

19. "with the back of my shirt soaked"?

In Tucson, that's daily life.

Nobody even remembers it.

Because it's daily life.