Today is 42.2 C for me today. Then you factor humidity on top of that and it becomes like the gates of hell. Then I remember that I live in dallas and I basically already am in hell.
Oh shit. Honestly I feel more for you guys than me. We have infrastructure built for it. Everything has AC. I even just put a window unit in my bedroom to take some load off the older main unit that has been struggling to keep up. But over there you were never built for that kind of heat. I wish you all the best with climate change.
That sucks. Yeah - we have those temps in Texas for months at a time, but at least we have air conditioning most places.
It’s also one of the reasons development is so hostile for pedestrians and cyclists here. We design everything around taking air conditioning with us wherever we go, which leads to car-first development.
I was going to make snark remarks on the fact that a lot of people live in hostile environments and it’s not super sustainable because we need climate control year round in every building and cars, but I live in Canada and it would be pretty hypocritical given the fact that I need climate control most of the year too. In fact, sometimes in winter when I watch the endless ballet of machinery burning oil to plow and move the snow, I wonder why we go through such trouble to live here.
I guess we get used to a lot of things. However 42C is too much for my taste. I go vacationing in the Caribbean where it’s usually around 30C, and it’s pretty much my limit.
What’s funny is that I used to live in Phoenix for a year. I would happily take the higher dry heat over the almost as high wet heat. When I lived there it was like walking into an oven and you could feel your sweat pours opening. But the sweating evaporated quickly and provided cooling as long as you stayed hydrated. Shade works and you can see how the natives protected themselves from the sun and had passive cooling that worked. In the wet heat it is more like Satan is pissing on you and you have no hope. Your body is dumping sweat and it does nothing because the humidity is too high to evaporate. Shade? Worthless beyond the immediate sun protection. A few degrees at most. Without AC you will only cool with high winds or a fan.
Fun fact I never knew until living there: when it hits 112 (and it does) the airport has to partially shut down and divert all non-high-temp aircraft. The tarmac is so hot it will pop normal tires at a high rate. So unless you have the expensive higher temp rated tires for planes based out of high temp areas, then you can’t land there when it is too hot.
I mean, we don’t need it. People survived for hundreds of thousands of years without AC in harsh climates. Our adaptability is one of the reasons we’re the dominant species.
Those temps are not abnormal for that part of Texas in the summer. We did have a few years of relatively cool summers, though.
I grew up in Texas. I am peak millennial (dead center of the generation). I remember growing up in Houston and seeing dallas would get light snow most winters and “artic blasts” were never a thing. Heat waves never got above 104. It was a record just hitting it, and was unheard to go above it before that.
Now? Ever year it is all but guaranteed it will get above 104. Normal snow in dallas? Nope. Ice storms from polar vortex collapse only.
This is what climate change looks like. These temps are absolutely abnormal when you look at the hundred plus years of recorded climate data. Our adaption as a species is our technology. AC.
Less our dynamic adaptability, and more due to our evolutionary adaptations. We have several super-powers when it comes to working hard in the heat. They mainly don’t work in high humidity, however.
European here, just had two weeks of temperatures never going below 30c even at night. I had 34c at 3am the other day… We basically are all in hell at this point.
I am in the sciences. I support measuring in C and accept its rational design. But being American I also understand the appeal of F. Of the two scales it best describes the human experience. When we are talking about the weather and how it will impact my very human day, I want F. When I an measuring my whatever-the-fuck-else for science I want it in C.
But being American I also understand the appeal of F.
Only because that’s what you’ve been exposed to. The weather report might as well have been in gibberish when they talked temperatures when I was visiting the US
Today is 42.2 C for me today. Then you factor humidity on top of that and it becomes like the gates of hell. Then I remember that I live in dallas and I basically already am in hell.
The European mind can not comprehend…
Friday looks pretty chill. Something to look forward to!
I lived in Dallas for 3 years. It is hell. I’ll be praying for your escape.
We do now, where we live in France we just had 44°. So my condolences and please stay stay safe out there.
Oh shit. Honestly I feel more for you guys than me. We have infrastructure built for it. Everything has AC. I even just put a window unit in my bedroom to take some load off the older main unit that has been struggling to keep up. But over there you were never built for that kind of heat. I wish you all the best with climate change.
Getting AC where we live is very difficult to install (we have 40 to 50cm thick walls) and expensive to run.
That sucks. Yeah - we have those temps in Texas for months at a time, but at least we have air conditioning most places.
It’s also one of the reasons development is so hostile for pedestrians and cyclists here. We design everything around taking air conditioning with us wherever we go, which leads to car-first development.
I was going to make snark remarks on the fact that a lot of people live in hostile environments and it’s not super sustainable because we need climate control year round in every building and cars, but I live in Canada and it would be pretty hypocritical given the fact that I need climate control most of the year too. In fact, sometimes in winter when I watch the endless ballet of machinery burning oil to plow and move the snow, I wonder why we go through such trouble to live here.
I guess we get used to a lot of things. However 42C is too much for my taste. I go vacationing in the Caribbean where it’s usually around 30C, and it’s pretty much my limit.
What’s funny is that I used to live in Phoenix for a year. I would happily take the higher dry heat over the almost as high wet heat. When I lived there it was like walking into an oven and you could feel your sweat pours opening. But the sweating evaporated quickly and provided cooling as long as you stayed hydrated. Shade works and you can see how the natives protected themselves from the sun and had passive cooling that worked. In the wet heat it is more like Satan is pissing on you and you have no hope. Your body is dumping sweat and it does nothing because the humidity is too high to evaporate. Shade? Worthless beyond the immediate sun protection. A few degrees at most. Without AC you will only cool with high winds or a fan.
Fun fact I never knew until living there: when it hits 112 (and it does) the airport has to partially shut down and divert all non-high-temp aircraft. The tarmac is so hot it will pop normal tires at a high rate. So unless you have the expensive higher temp rated tires for planes based out of high temp areas, then you can’t land there when it is too hot.
I mean, we don’t need it. People survived for hundreds of thousands of years without AC in harsh climates. Our adaptability is one of the reasons we’re the dominant species.
Those temps are not abnormal for that part of Texas in the summer. We did have a few years of relatively cool summers, though.
I grew up in Texas. I am peak millennial (dead center of the generation). I remember growing up in Houston and seeing dallas would get light snow most winters and “artic blasts” were never a thing. Heat waves never got above 104. It was a record just hitting it, and was unheard to go above it before that.
Now? Ever year it is all but guaranteed it will get above 104. Normal snow in dallas? Nope. Ice storms from polar vortex collapse only.
This is what climate change looks like. These temps are absolutely abnormal when you look at the hundred plus years of recorded climate data. Our adaption as a species is our technology. AC.
Less our dynamic adaptability, and more due to our evolutionary adaptations. We have several super-powers when it comes to working hard in the heat. They mainly don’t work in high humidity, however.
As a species, we don’t need it, but as individuals we do.
Hotter than boiling water !
Water boils at 100 centigrade or 212 farenheit. Try again.
I flew to San Antonio a few yewrs ago. I remember it being about 10 degrees cooler than Tulsa.
I didn’t go outside in Dallas, though.
The City of Brotherly Hate
European here, just had two weeks of temperatures never going below 30c even at night. I had 34c at 3am the other day… We basically are all in hell at this point.
Yeah, it’s definitely brutal if you’re not acclimated to it.
We have that sort of heat in Australia, and use Celsius like rational people
I am in the sciences. I support measuring in C and accept its rational design. But being American I also understand the appeal of F. Of the two scales it best describes the human experience. When we are talking about the weather and how it will impact my very human day, I want F. When I an measuring my whatever-the-fuck-else for science I want it in C.
Only because that’s what you’ve been exposed to. The weather report might as well have been in gibberish when they talked temperatures when I was visiting the US