Rex Trulove
You might have heard in the news about how unusual and strange the heatwave of 2019 has been. This isn’t totally false in that it isn’t common. However, it also is a long way from being unheard of, as much as the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration would like people to believe that it has never happened before.
In fact, it has happened before, with far more devastating results than the one that occurred this year, although the population is now far greater.
Note that this is an actual newspaper clipping from July 25, 1936; a little over 93 years ago. The image of that newspaper article is shown so people will realize that it really was from a newspaper of the time. This is the text that was written in the article, typos and grammatical errors kept intact:
Heat Wave Toll Over 12,000 in 86 Cities in Week
Washington, July 25 (LP)__The first official figures on the death toll of last week’s heat wave indicated today that literally thousands of lives were lost in the temperatures of 100 degrees and higher throughout a large part of the nation.
The census bureau released mortality statistics today for the week ending July 18 showing 3332 more deaths in 86 cities than in the worst heat week of 1934.
For the week ended July 18, the bureau reported 12,183 deaths this year compared with 8,851 deaths in the same 86 cities for the week ended July 28 in 1934. The present drought was blamed for a 65 per cent rise in deaths as compared with the corresponding 1935 week, when 7439 deaths were reported during that week of normal temperatures.
In our recent heatwave of 2019, which some sources claimed was the worst in history, not nearly as many people died from the heat. In fact, the number of people who’ve died from the heat in 2019 isn’t even close to the total in 1936.
This shows the danger of believing what NOAA and the National Weather Service says about weather records, which they’ve been caught altering the data a number of times.
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Question of
Are you surprised to learn that over 12,000 people died of the heat in 1936 in the US?
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Yes
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No
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I already knew or suspected this
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I even remember times when it was hotter than this year
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Question of
Are you surprised to learn that NOAA has been caught several times altering record data to make it appear hotter now than it was in the past?
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Yes
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No
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I’ve known about this for a while
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I still believe NOAA’s records
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I disbelieve the proof that shows that NOAA altered the data
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First of all, NOAA isn’t responsible for the published weather other than the temperature of the ocean.
The USGS and the NWS are responsible for weather data.
The “data” has been changed conspiracy theory is not even really a theory. The information published is updated constantly.
The reality of this year’s heat issue HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE US. We are one nation in the world.
Greenland has the largest glacier ice melt in the past well at least 1200 years. That is as of August with a month of summer remaining.
https://nsidc.org/greenland-today/
US is only one country. The impact of a hot summer is huge in Europe, Greenland and the two polar ice packs.
Ae I have said before, not much surprises me any more. I know I am ready for cooler weather. Triple digits this week.
We’ve been having the cooler weather here. Right after the hottest day of the year, we had an abrupt drop of about 20 degrees and it went down after that. The day before yesterday struggled to get above 70 and yesterday, it was in the upper 70s. Our next week’s forecast is for high temperatures varying between the low 70s to the mid-80s. That is a good thing because it is time for me to trim back all the irises at church. I’d rather get it done in a few days than a few weeks, but if the temps were too hot, I could only work at it for an hour or two at a time.
Welcome to the global warming era. You need an air conditioner all day.
Imagine what it was like 2,000 years ago when it actually was hotter. They didn’t have air conditioners back then. Climate fluctuates so much, though, that it probably won’t be all that long, geologically, before the next ice age begins.
It is way too early to tell if the shorter summers and longer, much colder winters of the last dozen years have been anything more than a simple trend and normal fluctuation. I fully expect yet another longer and below normal cold winter yet again this year, but I hope I’m wrong.
Modern a/c did not become common in homes until the 1950s and may have accounted for some of the deaths. I’m sure there have been heat waves in the past; but I still believe in global warming and climate change. Thank you for your informative article.
I’m sure that lack of AC had a lot to do with the deaths, though AC still isn’t common in all areas even now. It isn’t common here in Montana, for one, though we do have a small unit that I bought two years ago. Still, along with the untampered data (which isn’t easy to find), it was far hotter in 1936 than it has been this year.
As for climate change, the climate has been changing for over 3,500,000,000 years. I wouldn’t ever expect it to stop changing and sure hope that it never does. If it did, we would no longer have an atmosphere, so scientifically, the climate has always changed.
As for global warming, the globe has also been measurably warming for the past 11,000 years. If it wasn’t, New York would still be under a mile and a half of ice, as would this part of Montana. The globe is still substantially cooler than it was since the first of the ice ages began. The global temperatures haven’t increased very much over the last century…on the order of a few tenths of one degree…and they are still far cooler than in other interglacial periods of time, but the temperatures are warming, as has happened just before each of the last ice ages. The fact that global temperatures aren’t increasing very rapidly and aren’t nearly as high as many times in the past (including twice in the last 2,000 years) certainly doesn’t mean that there isn’t global warming. Even the trend for much colder winters and shorter summers through most of the northern US over the past dozen years doesn’t mean that the globe isn’t warming, it is just a trend, not climate.
A lot depends on what a person wants to compare to, though. It is much cooler today than it was at the time of Jesus, @2,000 years ago. However, it is far warmer today than it was in the late 1600s, during the time of the little ice age. I merely contend that too much is made about totally normal fluctuations that have also happened in the past. It should be remembered that for over 95% of the time the earth has been around, there have been no polar ice caps at all. So what is the ‘normal’ surface temperature?
Thank you for your detailed counter. All very interesting and something to think about.