Heat waves sizzling Northern Hemisphere

10:26, July 12, 2010


Heat waves have swept across Europe, North America，Russia, and elsewhere in Northern Hemisphere since the start of this July with thousands of reported fatalities. As heat waves hit the southwestern part of Europe, temperature in Iberia Peninsula climbed to 43 degrees Celsius.

Spain has faced temperature up to 44 degrees Celsius as the heat wave continued, and Madrid, its capital and largest city, recorded 37 degrees Celsius last Wednesday and 39 degrees Celsius on Thursday. In Portugal, temperatures reached 39 degrees Celsius in the capital Lisbon,

This round of heat waves in Iberia Peninsula is attributed to the hot air mass that departs from Northern Africa as the 1000 meter level, which facilitated North-African air masses to move to the Balkans via the Strait of Gibraltar, note media reports from Spain. The northern half of Africa is primarily desert or arid, constraining Sahara.

As a matter of course, Spain does enjoy a generous amount of sunshine in the summer time, but the country is known for its aridity however and most of its land is spoilt by the sun-baking hot summer.

In the meanwhile, people in Spain have all along cheered their team particularly after it won the FIFA 2010 World Cap, and Spanish people are very excited, over-joyous and zealous over their team's historic victory. In these hottest days, people in Spain were told to modify their outdoor activities and advised to drink more water from time to time.

Meanwhile, various regions in Russia have subjected to extraordinary scorching weather. Temperatures in Moscow and adjacent cities reached 31 degrees Celsius on July 7. The climate in the Yakut ASSR is drastically continental, and a local city recorded 35.3 degrees Celsius last Wednesday, and the climate climax would reportedly sustain for a couple of days. In these scorching days, many Russians go swimming and enjoy the lounge in the sun near some swimming pools or fountains in parks.

Unfortunately, hundreds of people have drowned in Russia, trying to keep cool during a heatwave that has swept across the country. Six kids and a counselor from a summer camp on the Sea of Azov drowned on July 6, after a heat current drew them into the deep water. These drowned kids came to the summer camp in Russia's south From Moscow.

"Last week, 285 people died in Russia's waterways," an emergency ministry spokesman told the Ria Novosti news agency. "The main reason for people drowning is swimming in places that are not appropriate, and the use of alcohol." A record-breaking heatwave in late June saw temperatures reach 37 degrees Celsius in central Russian regions, sparking forest fires.

Some agricultural experts in Russia today are worried that the hot, dry weather could lead to crop failure in their country, but there is an exception on the part of Russian farmers and particularly fruit growers, who take joy in an abundance of watermelons from the Astrakhan Republic at the Volga Delta, which have packed the stalls in Moscow, St. Petersburg, the Ural mountain resort of Yekaterinburg, and other major Russian cities.

As for the heat wave in North America, which hit Northeast part of the U.S. and "boiled" New York City, whose temperature soared to record 103 degrees Fahreinheit (39.4 degrees Celsius) on July 6, and the temperature reached 37.8 degrees Celsius in Boston, and to 40.6 degrees Celsius in Baltimore on the same day, an all-time high in 27 years after 1983.

The U.S. East Coast and parts of the Midwest, have seen temperatures reaching 38 degrees Celsius and higher, pushing power companies to the limit, and driving residents to municipal "cooling centers", according to AFP reports. New York authorities advised residents to use parks and outdoor pools rather than opening fire hydrants to cool off, calling on locals to reduce electricity use during the peak hours of 1 p.m. and 7 p.m., and to keep "strenuous activity" to between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

Heat waves overload the electric-power supply system and put it to a severe test. A record-breaking heave wave has tightened its grip on the New York City. Con Edison, with an ability that might strike some as Big Brother-like, even exercised its ability to periodically shut off central air-conditioning units in some 20,000 homes and businesses to ease the burden on its system, according to "New York Times".

Utilities ask customers to curb electricity use as the high temperatures from Virginia to Maine strained air conditioners and raised power use in New York… About 375,400 customers in those neighborhoods, which include Flushing, Gowanus, Forest Hills and Brooklyn heights among others, were affected.

By People's Daily Online and its authors are PD reporters Zhang Jinjiang, Zhang Guangzheng and Wu Yun residing respectively in Spain, Russia and the U.S.