Americans Swelter Through Fifth Day of Heat Wave

Sweltering Heat - (ABCNEWS.com) By Chris Michaud

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Commuters baked on subway platforms that felt like furnaces on Thursday while children cooled off in pools as the U.S. northeast and parts of the Midwest staggered through the fifth straight day of an oppressive heat wave that has already killed at least 20 people.

In some areas like the New York state capital Albany, streets were almost deserted as people took shelter in air-conditioned homes and businesses or in neighborhood and city pools.

It's just too hot for them to even come out to buy food to eat,'' said Paul Giordano, who sells produce at Philadelphia's open-air Italian Market. Vendors said sales of fruit, vegetables and poultry were off by as much as 50 percent for this time of year.

In New York City the temperature reached a record 103 degrees Fahrenheit while in neighboring Newark, New Jersey it topped 105 degrees Fahrenheit, the National Weather Service (news - web sites) said. The old record in both cities was 100 F set on Aug. 9, 1949.

The mercury rose to 100 F in many other cities and towns from Maine to Virginia, taxing tempers and electricity supplies.

Three people, two of them 75 years old, have so far died this week due to extremely hot weather in Baltimore, Maryland the city's Health Department said. Six people were treated for heat exhaustion Thursday at the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center.

New York and New Jersey officials ordered all nonessential state offices closed at 2 p.m. EDT to help conserve energy and offset an expected late afternoon surge in demand.

The Philadelphia medical examiner's office reported three heat-related deaths, two women and one man ages 66 to 79, bringing the city's tally to four for this week. Heart disease contributed to all three deaths, autopsies showed.

New York Gov. George Pataki ordered parking and admittance fees waived at parks statewide including on Long Island, where bathers swarmed to the renowned beaches by the thousands in search of relief from the searing heat.

In New York City municipal pools stayed open until 8 p.m. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani (news - web sites) called on supervisors of city employees to use common sense in delegating duties, saying ``strenuous work is not suggested at this time, unless it's an absolute emergency.''

On a Times Square subway platform, Christopher Hercules, 21, wiped his brow with a towel, saying ``It's much hotter down here than it is outside. But I'm getting used to it.''

Electricity demand was so high that lights flickered in New York when the metropolitan area suffered scattered outages. Three major power grids in New York, New England and the mid-Atlantic states said they expected heavy use of air conditioners to push electricity demand to record levels for the third straight day.

THUNDERSTORMS EXPECTED TO BREAK SPELL ON FRIDAY

Midwestern cities like Chicago and Detroit were also boiling, but unlike the northeast they could expect some relief when thunderstorms move across the area on Friday morning, meteorologists said.

Kentucky has counted three heat-related deaths in recent days, all construction workers. Wisconsin reported 10 deaths because of the heat.

Meteorologists said the extreme temperatures and humidity, which have pushed the heat index to 105 to 110 F in several states, would continue for one more day in the northeast region Friday with temperatures forecast around 94 F.

Thunderstorms would help cool things down over the weekend, allowing authorities to end the succession of excessive heat warnings and calls for energy conservation that have characterized a scorching week for millions of people.

The National Weather Service said heat advisories were issued on Thursday for parts of 10 states in the East, among them Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, the Carolinas and Georgia.

In Boston as temperatures approached a record 99 F, residents and tourists flocked to malls, museums, movie theaters or any place where the air conditioning pumped out cool air.

At the New England Aquarium, crowds surged through the doors to a blast of cold air. ``Oh, thank you God,'' Mike Madison exclaimed. ``I didn't want to die out there.''

Some 80 volunteers were checking on the city's elderly, and officials were investigating the death of a 3-year-old girl from Rowley who collapsed on Wednesday while playing outside. Officials said heat may have been a factor.

The New Jersey utility PSE&G said only scattered outages affecting a few hundred homes had occurred by midday, but the utility was on warning from power operator PJM, which controls the mid-Atlantic grid.

About 6,000 lost power on Tuesday and Wednesday in Hoboken, New Jersey, as the utility repaired lines at a substation. Power was restored to all by about 2:30 a.m. on Thursday.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Answers

"Current-Americans" -- the new ethnic group started by our tribe here? But will we breed true? ;)

Surprisingly, last night was the first time I've seen people take refuge at the mall with the heat. Two nights ago it was utterly dead, as it has been on other very hot days. Don't know if it means that more people now have A/C in this area where we sometimes used to need down quilts on July nights back in the old days.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Perhaps it's really meant to be "Currant-Americans"--I know I feel like a dried-up, er, what the hell does currant come from? Currants are very popular for baked goods in the UK; we called them dead flies. Individual meat pies were called babies' heads. We were terrible schoolchildren. Then there's toad in the hole and angels on horseback, as you probably remember from your misspent youth in Bath.

But I digress. It must be this damnable heat. The Hungarian and I went to our favorite diner yesterday morning and there were only two other customers in there. It was 10 a.m. and already 91 degrees. Outrageous! It hit a hundred today and the same is expected tomorrow. Ugh! Heavy, muggy, snotty, nasty. And the weather's awful too. (Snort! Oops!)

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Hi, Current is used as a catagory header, as in current news. I was more sleepy in the middle of the night when I was posting, them I am now...without any sleep. I gues you could say my sleep pattern is messed up again.

I went out this morning (at day break) to hang clothes out on the line and it was humid and yukky. I've got to go to the post office and a couple of other places this morning, before it gets awful. There must be a leak in the car A/C, so I haven't had air conditioning all summer. Just another thing that I've put off doing.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Yeah, I knew that! But there are Some People who don't look at or even use the categories and the old git has to go and fix the damn thing so the archives are properly indexed. Thanks for categorizing, Mags!

I have lived without AC and as God is mah witness Ah'll never go sweaty again.

I hung clothes out the other day and they stayed out for three days because it was too hot to struggle with them and I kept forgetting to get them in when it was cool-ish. I'm not doing laundry again until the temp goes below 90. So there.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

I've done the same thing, hanging the clothes out and then not bringing them in for a couple days. Off I go to the store, before I want to go to bed and get some sleep.

PS Recieved the wedge yesterday and it does help.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

I was just gently playing with the words, I do appreciate good categorizing. Currants conjugates as currents, dried currants, and Ribena, doesn't it?

And it was 4 AM, I couldn't sleep myself. Thunderstorms expected to move some of this this afternoon. I hope I hope.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Must be something in the season-ing...

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001

Gawd--Ribena! Concentrated blackcurrant juice--coma in a bottle! I used to mix that stuff with plain club soda--yummy! Also good in champagne.

-- Anonymous, August 10, 2001