Tag Archives: Phoenix

Over 300 suspected heat-related deaths under investigation in single Arizona County

Phoenix-firefighters-Matt-York-AP

Important Takeaways:

  • Almost 100 suspected heat deaths are attributed to a single week, from July 7 to 13, when temperatures reached 118 degrees.
  • A heat report dashboard run by Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and is the fourth most-populated county in the United States with 4.4 million people, showed 322 deaths are suspected to have been a result of heat-related illness in the year to July 13 — a huge increase on last year.
  • There have been 23 confirmed deaths in the county related to heat this year, the data shows, 17 of which were directly caused by heat and 6 which were “heat-contributed.”
  • There have been at least 73 heat-related deaths across the U.S. this year so far, according to an ongoing count by NBC News.
  • The DHH said a quarter of last year’s deaths happened indoors, with air conditioning units not working properly for two thirds of those victims.
  • The heat dashboard was launched by the county in May to better track illness and death as a result of extreme temperatures.

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Seven million people remain under Florida flood watch; Severe Weather alerts across the US

Hallandale-Beach-Florida-Flooding

Important Takeaways:

  • Florida is bracing for another day of rain and devastating flash flooding despite already reeling from historic rainfall that has left entire neighborhoods underwater.
  • An additional 2 to 5 inches of rain could fall, the fourth straight day of flood concerns for South Florida.
  • Elsewhere in the U.S., 31 million people are under the risk for severe storms Friday across two areas: one across the western high Plains and the other in the Northeast.
  • This weekend 12 million people are under heat alerts across the West and into Southwest Texas with triple-digit highs forecast including a high of 113 in Phoenix forecast Saturday.
  • Highs in the 90s are forecast for the Southeast, where high humidity will make it feel like over 100 degrees.

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Phoenix, Las Vegas, Death Valley break temperature records with millions affected by heat alerts

Record-High-Temps

Important Takeaways:

  • Phoenix reached a sweltering 113 degrees Fahrenheit on Thursday — beating the previous daily record for this time of year of 111 degrees set in 2016
  • Las Vegas set a new record of 111 degrees for June 6, the National Weather Service confirmed
  • In Death Valley, California, thermometers reached 122 degrees, beating the record of 121 set in 1996. The hottest temperature ever recorded in the United States was 134 degrees, at Death Valley in 1913
  • Some 86 million people across the continental United States will face heat of 90 degrees or more on Friday, while in the southwestern states at least 14 million can expect 100 degrees or more.

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Extreme heat wave brings scorching record highs to Southwest

Weather-billboard-Phoenix

Important Takeaways:

  • Phoenix is forecast to hit a whopping 113 degrees Fahrenheit; Las Vegas may reach 112; and Death Valley, California, could be at 121 on Thursday amid an extreme heat wave.
  • Twenty-seven million people are under heat warnings and advisories today, as a heat dome essentially traps warm air from the Golden State down to southern Texas.
  • By Friday, the heat wave will expand north into Oregon and Washington on Friday and Saturday, and ease Sunday across the Southwest
  • Heat will also impact the Florida peninsula from Thursday into the weekend with several high and low temperature records forecast to be tied or broken from Jacksonville down to Tampa and Miami.
  • On Thursday, Miami has a forecast heat index of 105.

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Blazing heatwave for western US where some cities will surpass 100 degrees

Toasty-weather-map

Important Takeaways:

  • Phoenix and Las Vegas are among the cities that will experience blazing heat in the West this week — and the widespread hot and dry conditions will escalate the wildfire threat across the region.
  • The combination of a bulge in the jet stream, high pressure building at most levels of the atmosphere and a storm offshore of California will allow the heat to build without any shower or thunderstorm activity for about 50 million people in the West.
  • “Sacramento, California, will challenge the daily record high temperature of 103 F by Tuesday, with a current forecast that would match the record set in 1935,”
  • Farther south, in Fresno, California, temperatures are projected to be around 105 F
  • In Las Vegas, temperatures are forecast to hit 108 on Wednesday, 111 on Thursday and 110 on Friday.
  • Temperatures are forecast to reach at least 110 degrees in Phoenix from Wednesday to Friday.
  • According to the United States Drought Monitor, more extensive and deeper soil drought conditions are expanding over parts of the interior Southwest, especially in New Mexico and parts of West Texas.
  • Recent heavy rain in much of the Northwest will keep the risk of wildfires low in the short term.

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Heat Wave the most intense on record for nearily a month in Phoenix

Phoenix Heatwave Chart

Matthew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.

Important Takeaways:

  • The Valley of the Sun has seen temperatures of 110 degrees or above for nearly a month now, and AccuWeather forecasters now say this could make it the most intense heat wave the city has experienced since records began.
  • The Valley of the Sun has sweltered under temperatures of 110 degrees Fahrenheit or higher for 24 consecutive days and counting. The old record streak of 18 days at or above a high temperature of 110 degrees, set in 1974,
  • On the hottest day of that stretch, the mercury reached 118 degrees Fahrenheit on July 27. The lowest high temperature of the stretch came a day later when the mercury “only” hit 109 degrees
  • Heat is the number one weather-related cause of death in the U.S., outpacing tornadoes, floods and even hurricanes.

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Propane facility in Phoenix near Sky Harbor Airport literally explodes

Propane Explosion Pheonix

Matthew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.

Important Takeaways:

  • RAGING INFERNO Explosions near Phoenix airport in Arizona with ‘propane tanks blasted into air’ as crews battle fire in 119-degree heat
  • The fire tore through an Arizona propane business on Thursday and sent tanks of gas flying 500 yards into the air like “missiles.”
  • Firefighters battled the flames next to the Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport beginning at around 5pm while enduring record-breaking 119-degree heat.
  • Phoenix Fire Captain Rob McDade called the situation at the propane shop “very dangerous,” adding of the gas tanks: “They literally become missiles.”
  • More than 150 firefighters raced to the scene and cleared a mile radius around the business.
  • The unpredictable blaze came in the middle of crushing heat as Phoenix experienced its hottest day of the year.
  • The 119 degrees in Phoenix smashed a previous record high, according to the National Weather Service.

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Triple-digit heat baking Southwest and Southeast

Luke 21:11 There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven.

Important Takeaways:

  • The unrelenting heat will stay throughout the week
  • More than 35 million Americans are on alert for dangerous heat that’s baking the Southeast and Southwest.
  • This could be the worst heat wave ever for the Phoenix area. Phoenix has reached 110 degrees or above for 10 days straight, and could reach its record of 18 days straight.
  • In the Southeast, the heat is infiltrating cities from Dallas to Houston to New Orleans to Miami.
  • The heat index — what the temperature feels like with humidity — is forecast to climb above 100 degrees for much of this week in areas from Dallas to Miami.
  • Water temperatures are reaching about 90 degrees in Miami and 92 degrees in Key West, Florida. Miami on average hits its warmest water of the year — 87 degrees — in August.

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Trump supporters protest outside Arizona vote center

By Mimi Dwyer

PHOENIX (Reuters) – A crowd of Donald Trump supporters, some armed with rifles and handguns, gathered outside an election center in Arizona on Wednesday night after unsubstantiated rumors that votes for the Republican president were deliberately not being counted.

Chanting “Stop the steal!,” and “Count my vote,” the mostly unmasked protesters stood in front of the Maricopa County Elections Department in Phoenix, as Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden held a razor thin lead in the critical battleground state. Some news outlets have called Arizona for Biden, but Trump’s campaign says it is still in play.

A victory for Biden in Arizona would give the Democrat 11 electoral votes, a major boost in his bid to win the White House, while severely narrowing Trump’s path to re-election, in a state the Republican won in 2016.

On Election night Fox News and the Associated Press called Arizona for Biden, even though only just over 70% of the vote had been counted, a move that infuriated Trump and his aides.

Some of the roughly 200 protesters, who were faced by a line of armed county sheriffs, chanted “Shame on Fox!”. Some said they came out after a tweet from Mike Cernovich, a right-wing activist.

Chris Michael, 40, from Gilbert, Arizona, said he came to make sure all votes are counted. He said he wants assurances that the counting was done “ethically and legally.”

Rumors spread on Facebook Tuesday night that some Maricopa votes were not being counted because voters used Sharpie pens to mark their ballots. Local election officials insisted that was not true.

With the count still under way in several key states, Trump has accused the Democrats of trying to steal the election without evidence and filed lawsuits in several states related to vote-counting.

A similar scene played out on Wednesday afternoon in downtown Detroit, where city election officials blocked about 30 people, mostly Republicans, from entering a vote-counting hall amid unfounded claims that the vote count was fraudulent.

Trump has filed a lawsuit in Michigan to stop vote-counting that the secretary of state called “frivolous.”

The protests echoed the “Brooks Brother riot” during the 2000 recount in Florida that ultimately handed the presidency to Republican George W. Bush. A crowd of blazer-clad Republican protesters stormed a building where a hand recount was underway in a heavily Democratic district, forcing poll workers to stop counting ballots.

The protest is now viewed as a significant event in keeping Bush’s slender vote advantage in Florida intact. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately stopped the Florida recount, handing Bush the presidency and defeat to Democrat Al Gore.

(Reporting by Mimi Dwyer in Phoenix; writing by Tim Reid; Editing by Heather Timmons and Richard Pullin)

Suspected Arizona serial killer kills self as officers close in: police

A man suspected of killing four people in Phoenix, appears in this police sketch provided by the Phoenix Police Department, in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S., June 4, 2018. Phoenix Police Department/Handout via REUTERS

By David Schwartz

PHOENIX (Reuters) – A man suspected of killing four people, including a noted psychiatrist who advised prosecutors investigating high-profile murders, killed himself on Monday as police closed in on the Phoenix-area hotel where he was staying, police said.

Investigators had been searching for the suspect since Steven Pitt, a 59-year-old psychiatrist who consulted on serial killings and the 1996 murder of child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey, was found dead outside his office on Thursday, the first of a string of killings that left the Phoenix area on edge.

The suspect, who was not immediately identified, fatally shot himself in a hotel room as tactical units closed in to arrest him, police said on Monday.

The suspect also was wanted for murdering paralegals Veleria Sharp, 48, and Laura Anderson, 49, and Marshall Levine, a 72-year-old counselor and psychologist.

Officers heard several gunshots coming from inside the room as they were evacuating people from the extended-stay hotel in Scottsdale, said Sergeant Vince Lewis, a Phoenix police spokesman. No officers were injured, Lewis said.

He said police have evidence that links the four murders to the suspect, but declined to elaborate.

No motive was immediately released.

Pitt was discovered dead outside his office on Thursday, police said, noting that witnesses said they heard a loud argument followed by several gunshots.

Pitt had been a consultant in several high-profile cases, including the 2005-2006 Baseline Killer murders that claimed the lives of nine people. He also served as a consultant to prosecutors in the grand jury probe into death of 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey, who was found bludgeoned and strangled in her parents’ Boulder, Colorado home. No charges were ever filed in that case.

The two paralegals were shot and killed in their legal office in downtown Scottsdale on Friday, police said. One woman was found after she had walked to a nearby intersection to seek help and later died.

Officers followed the blood trail to the office and found the second woman dead at the scene from a gunshot wound.

Levine was found at about 12:10 a.m. on Saturday by an acquaintance, according to police.

(Additional reporting by Keith Coffman in Denver; Editing by Scott Malone and Marguerita Choy)