Las Vegas is the fastest-warming city in the United States. The city’s poorest residents are most at risk in the heat
Dan HernandezLast modified on Tue 3 Sep 2019 21.58 BST
The Clark county death investigator Jill Roberts vividly recalls the sunny 115F (46C) afternoon last summer when she entered a Las Vegas home with no functional air conditioning. The indoor heat felt even worse than the broiling temperature outside. She climbed up the stairs, through thick, stifling air, landing in a third-story bedroom where the resident had died in sweltering conditions. The room had no fan and the door was shut. It felt as if it couldn’t get any hotter.“Our elements are unforgiving. Especially on those 115F days, it doesn’t take a lot,” Roberts told the Guardian.“In that situation I’ll go stand in the sun in the 115F heat to do my paperwork as opposed to staying in the house because it’s that hot.”
The coroner’s office in Clark county, which encompasses Las Vegas, often records heat as a contributing factor to accidental deaths. There are hikers succumbing to lethal temperatures in the surrounding desert and heat-related deaths in cars and homes when occupants forgo cooling. Roberts has seen homeless people with post-mortem burns from collapsing on hot streets.
And it will get worse. Las Vegas is the fastest-warming city in the United States, its temperatures having risen 5.76F since 1970. A June study of coroner data by the Las Vegas-based Desert Research Institute found a correlation between heatwaves and heat-related deaths in southern Nevada, both of which, they say, are on the rise. And a recent Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) report warns that without global action to reduce carbon emissions, the city will probably experience 96 days of heat above 100F by the end of the century, including 60 days over 105F, and seven “off the chart” days that would break the current heat index.
The hellish future of Las Vegas in the climate crisis: ‘A place where we never go outside’ | The Guardian
Las Vegas is the fastest-warming city in the United States. The city’s poorest residents are most at risk in the heat Dan HernandezLast modified on Tue 3 Sep 2019 21.58 BST The Clark county death investigator Jill Roberts vividly recalls the sunny 115F (46C) afternoon last summer when she entered a Las Vegas home with… [Read More]
