A long-running heat wave that has already shattered previous records across the U.S. persisted on Sunday, baking parts of the West with dangerous temperatures that caused the death of a motorcyclist in Death Valley and held the East in its hot and humid grip.
An excessive heat warning — the National Weather Service’s highest alert — was in effect for about 36 million people, or about 10% of the population, said NWS meteorologist Bryan Jackson. Dozens of locations in the West and Pacific Northwest tied or broke previous heat records.
Many areas in Northern California surpassed 110 degrees (43.3 C), with the city of Redding topping out at a record 119 (48.3 C). Phoenix set a new daily record Sunday for the warmest low temperature: it never got below 92 F (33.3 C).
A high temperature of 128 F (53.3 C) was recorded Saturday and Sunday at Death Valley National Park in eastern California, where a visitor died Saturday from heat exposure and another person was hospitalized, officials said.
The thing is, this isn’t a new normal. Climate change is still happening and will keep happening as long as we keep refusing to migrate off of fossil fuels. It will be hotter next year. And then hotter the year after. And then hotter. And then hotter. And then fucking hotter. It won’t stop until enough of us literally die off to start mitigating it.