At a Glance
- A searing summer continues in parts of the Deep South.
- Notable records, including hottest daily lows and heat streaks, have been tied or set in recent days from Texas to Florida.
- That follows a record hot month in many of these areas.
- There's little relief from the heat ahead.
- Meanwhile, others in the U.S. continue to enjoy a stretch without extreme heat.
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Record heat continues to bake the Deep South from Texas to Florida and there is little or no relief in sight, in what will be the hottest summer on record for some.
While sweltering is a fact of life this time of year in the Deep South, some recent heat has smashed more notable records, including heat streaks and record hot daily lows.
(CURRENT MAPS: Temperatures | Heat Indices | Dew Points)
Let's highlight these latest records, then we'll look into the long-range forecast and also bring up who hasn't been all that hot recently.
Heat streak records recently tied or set:
- Austin, Texas (Camp Mabry), crushed its previous streak of 27 straight 100-degree-plus highs from July and August 2011. While their average high this time of year is around 100 degrees, the National Weather Service noted it's now been over two months since the city's last cooler-than-average day.
- Baton Rouge, Louisiana, reached at least 100 degrees for 10 straight days through Aug. 7, topping the previous record streak of 8 days in Aug. 1921. They also topped their all time hottest daily low on Aug. 10, dipping only to 85 degrees.
- College Station, Conroe and Huntsville, Texas, each shattered their previous record-long triple-digit heat streaks. In College Station and Huntsville, those streaks have lasted over a month.
- New Orleans soared to 100 degrees three straight days through Aug. 7, also topping their previous two-day long such streaks in Aug. 2010 and July 1980.
- Alexandria, Lafayette and New Iberia, Louisiana, easily leapfrogged their previous record triple-digit streaks.
One record streak finally came to an end. Tuscon, Arizona, obliterated their previous record 100-degree-plus streak from June-July 2013 by two full weeks, but that finally was snapped on Tuesday.
Some notable record highs and lows:
- Del Rio (111 degrees) and El Paso, Texas (112 degrees), each reached the 110s for the first time on record in August. Del Rio did that three times.
- San Angelo, Texas (111 degrees), tied their August record high on Aug. 10.
- Wichita Falls, Texas (113 degrees), tied their August record high on Aug. 9.
- St. Simons Island, Georgia (102 degrees), topped and Naples, Florida, tied their August record highs.
- Key West, Florida (88 degrees), had their all-time record hottest low temperature for any day on Aug. 9.
- Marathon, in Florida's Middle Keys, has either tied or set their new all-time record hottest low temperature 12 times since July 12. They most recently dipped only to 87 degrees on both Aug. 8, 9 and 10.
- Dallas-Ft. Worth also tied their all-time hottest daily low of 86 degrees both on Aug. 7 and 8.
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- Palacios, Texas (87 degrees) tied their all-time hottest daily low six times in August, all within seven days.
There's little relief ahead. Unfortunately, if you've had enough of this stifling heat, the next 1 to 2 weeks doesn't offer much relief, according to extended forecasts from both NOAA's Climate Prediction Center and The Weather Company.
Parts of the Southeast, including Florida, could see just a few degrees of relief next week.
But the overall hot pattern looks likely to continue until further notice across the South.
Why is this record heat lasting so long? This persistence is owing to a stubborn heat dome of high pressure aloft stretched across the South and Gulf of Mexico. This bubble of warm, sinking air suppresses clouds and rain, allowing full summer sunshine to heat the surface.
That stagnant pattern is also helping to keep both Gulf and Atlantic water much warmer than usual, even for the heart of summer. That warm water also keeps the air hotter than it otherwise would be, impacting areas near the coast such as Miami, Houston and New Orleans.
That followed a blazing hot July. If you've been following our coverage, you know this has been going on much of the summer.
According to NOAA's July U.S. recap released earlier this week, it was the hottest July on record in Arizona, Florida, Maine and New Mexico.
Over two dozen cities in the U.S. had their record hottest month this July.
However, a rather sizable swath of the nation's mid-section had a fairly docile July, as far as heat was concerned, and that has continued so far in August.
That's because the Northern Plains was caught in a trough squeezed by heat domes in place over northwest Canada's arctic and over Greenland, Labrador and Newfoundland.
This low-pressure "trough" ushered in occasional bouts of cooler air.
However, there are signals in long term computer models suggesting even the Northern Plains and upper Midwest could join in the heat later this month, as that southern heat dome could bulge northward.
Unfortunately for the heat-fatigued, there's still plenty of summer left.
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Jonathan Erdman is a senior meteorologist at weather.com and has been covering national and international weather since 1996. His lifelong love of meteorology began with a close encounter from a tornado as a child in Wisconsin. He studied physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, then completed his Master's degree working with dual-polarization radar and lightning data at Colorado State University. Extreme and bizarre weather are his favorite topics. Reach out to him on X/Twitter, Facebook and Threads.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
