Last month was the third-hottest July in the United States in NOAA’s 128-year record. The average overnight temperature was the hottest on record for any month. High temperatures at night are dangerous because the human body does not have a chance to cool down.
The heat was especially brutal in Texas, which saw its hottest July on record. Austin saw 40 consecutive days of triple-digit temperatures. California had its driest January to July period on record, and drought conditions expanded into the Northeast.
The pattern on display in Kentucky: devastating weather whiplash. Kentucky started the month with drought conditions and ended it with record rainfall and flash flooding, making it the state’s fourth-wettest July on record.
The risk of flash floods can increase after a drought. Those early-July drought conditions in Kentucky led to extremely dry and hardened soils that could not absorb much water. That, combined with the slopes and valleys of the landscape, resulted in an onslaught of water that ran rapidly off of the land surface.
The heat was especially brutal in Texas, which saw its hottest July on record. Austin saw 40 consecutive days of triple-digit temperatures. California had its driest January to July period on record, and drought conditions expanded into the Northeast.
The pattern on display in Kentucky: devastating weather whiplash. Kentucky started the month with drought conditions and ended it with record rainfall and flash flooding, making it the state’s fourth-wettest July on record.
The risk of flash floods can increase after a drought. Those early-July drought conditions in Kentucky led to extremely dry and hardened soils that could not absorb much water. That, combined with the slopes and valleys of the landscape, resulted in an onslaught of water that ran rapidly off of the land surface.
