Wednesday, September 5, 2007

Southern California's Labor Day weekend heat wave cause deaths and power outages

The second major heat wave of the 2007 calendar year had its grip on southern California over the Labor Day weekend and the holiday itself was a real scorcher. As mentioned in my Los Angeles weather report from Monday, the northern and eastern areas of the region saw temperatures climb well above the century mark. Closer to Los Angeles itself, readings rose to at least 15° above normal for this time of year. Many residents had to flock to the local beaches to escape the heat, but as many as 25 people weren't so lucky as that many have reportedly died as a result of the extreme weather conditions (16 of them in the Los Angeles metropolitan area alone). At one point, there were as many as 60,000 customers without power during the peak of the heat wave on Monday. So much for a nice 226th birthday present for the "City of Angels", huh? Very hot temperatures and power outages to make some even more miserable. Thanks, Mother Nature!

Here are the most notable high temperatures from Monday:

Chino... 111° (new record)
Ontario... 110°
Corona... 108°
Fullerton... 108°
Van Nuys... 108° (new record)
Riverside... 108°
Burbank... 106°
Pasadena... 106°
Long Beach... 103° (new record)
downtown Los Angeles... 99°
Santa Ana... 99° (new record)
Hawthorne... 96° (new record)
Culver City... 90°
Santa Monica... 90°
Torrance... 89°
Los Angeles International Airport... 88°
Santa Barbara... 86°


Since this was a very unusual hot spell even for sunny and warm southern California, the local media took notice with their coverage of the second major heat wave of 2007. Note that a few of the hyperlink titles are slightly outdated, but I made them available to show their relevancy from Monday and yesterday besides today's headlines.

KCBS-TV (Los Angeles)
(September 3):
Extreme heat bakes Southland on Labor Day weekend

(September 5):
25 Southland deaths may have been heat-related


KABC-TV (Los Angeles)
(September 3):
Southern California residents try to stay cool

(September 5):
Extreme heat blamed for more than a dozen deaths


Los Angeles Daily News (September 4):
Heat wave blamed in 12 deaths

Los Angeles Times (September 5):
Heat blamed in the deaths of 16

Orange County Register (September 5):
More than 6,500 in O.C. still without electricity

KNBC-TV (Burbank, CA) (September 5):
Thousands still without power after extreme heat wave

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