From Texas to Massachusetts, blazing heat roasts US states

Cities across a wide swath of the US tied or broke heat records on Saturday as blazing heat and humidity roasted states from Texas to Massachusetts, placing more than 38 million Americans under a heat advisory in the hottest hours of the day. Records fell in places like Austin, Texas, which hit 99F (37.2C) at its airport and 100F (37.7C) at Camp Mabry; Vicksburg, Mississippi, which reached 98F (36.6C); and Richmond, Virginia, where the thermometer climbed to 95F (35C). Philadelphia tied its record at 95F (35C), as did Worcester, Massachusetts, where temperatures reached 88F (31.1C).
At a community sidewalk sale in Philadelphia on Saturday, residents in the Fishtown neighbourhood displayed tables of old books, clothing and trinkets they were looking to sell for a little extra cash. Ashley Horowitz, 34, said she had a lot of people come by until her side of the street became bathed in direct sunlight in the early afternoon. In West Virginia, public health officials urged people to look out for symptoms of heat exhaustion. In Washington, DC, officials activated heat emergency plans, opening splash parks and cooling centres. A runner in the Brooklyn Half Marathon — where organisers had warned participants of potential heat concerns — died on Saturday morning, though it was not immediately clear if the weather had played a role.
Memorial Day, the unofficial start of summer, is still more than a week away. But by the end of the weekend, more than half of all Americans will have experienced temperatures of 90F (32.2C) or higher from a blast of hot air that started in the Southwest, swept across the eastern third of the country, and will move through New England into Canada. Washington, DC, reached a high of 92F (33.3C) on Saturday afternoon, three degrees shy of its daily record. New York City saw a high of 90F (32.2C); its record for May 21 is 93F (33.8C).
In other parts of the country, the misery set in weeks ago. In drought-parched New Mexico, the largest wildfire in the state’s recorded history is burning, months before the start of the peak fire season. Other blazes are driving evacuations and fears in Colorado, Arizona and Utah. Parts of Texas, where heat-intensified wildfires burned 30 structures near Abilene this week, saw their earliest triple-digit temperatures on record this month. And in a sign of just how strange things could get, Denver whiplashed from 90F (32.2C) weather this week to a late-spring snowfall overnight Friday into Saturday.
Above-average temperatures and drought conditions will contribute to high energy demand and put several parts of the country at elevated or high risk of energy shortfalls this summer, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation warned this week. In many places, temperatures could be 20 degrees or more above what residents are accustomed to for this time of year. The National Weather Service office in Gray, Maine, with a territory covering Maine and New Hampshire, noted that it had never before issued a heat advisory during the month of May.