Heat illness is the number one cause of weather-related deaths in the United States. To try to better prepare us for extreme heat, the CDC recently worked with the NWS to create a new heat tool called HeatRisk. Let's talk about the science behind it.
Today's HeatRisk in Southern Colorado has most of us in a moderate risk - down a peg from yesterday. This is mainly risky to those who don't have air conditioning or are particularly heat sensitive.
But the science here is how this product was developed. To explain, let's talk about how heat affects your body. Your body wants to stay at the same internal temperature. When you're exposed to hot temperatures, your body responds by sending blood to your skin and increasing how much you sweat. This takes heat from your core - which is warm - and moves it to the skin where it can radiate into the air. Your heart needs to pump harder to shuttle this blood to the skin, and you'll lose fluids faster due to the increased sweating.
This can lead to heat exhaustion and other heat related illnesses. But it's not just "how hot is the temperature". Today has been humid - so although today has been cooler in southern Colorado than yesterday, it still feels very hot. Your body can't cool down as easily when the air is humid.
The CDC and NWS product also considers how long the heat lasts. Multiple days of heat is harder for you to adapt to than a single day, and how normal that heat is for the time in question. If it's 90 degrees in May, you're more likely to be
. First - multiple days of heat is harder for your body to deal with than a single day. When
LET'S LOOK HOW HEAT AFFECTS YOUR BODY. FIRST… MULTIPLE DAYS OF HEAT IS HARDER ON YOUR BODY THAN A SINGLE DAY. THE HEAT RISK CALCULATION ALSO CONSIDERS HOW NORMAL THE HEAT IS FOR THE DATE IN QUESTION. 86 IN MARCH CAN BE HARDER FOR YOUR BODY TO ADAPT TO THAN 86 IN JULY. MAJOR AND EXTREME HEAT RISK IS CLASSIFIED BY BEING WITHIN THE TOP 5 PERCENT OF TEMPERATURES FOR THE DATE. OUR RECENT HEAT SURGES HAVE BROKEN SEVERAL RECORDS.
TEMPERATURES ARE COOLER TODAY THAN YESTERDAY…BUT THERE'S MORE WATER IN THE AIR NOW. OUR BODIES CAN'T COOL DOWN AS EASILY IN HUMID AIR…SO TODAY IS STILL A HARD DAY TO EXERCISE OUTSIDE. HEAT RISK CALCULATIONS USE A RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TEMPERATURE AND MOISTURE TO ESTIMATE THE IMPACT OF MUGGY AIR ON YOUR BODY.
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FINALLY, THE HEAT RISK CALCULATION CONSIDERS OVERNIGHT TEMPERATURES. SLEEP QUALITY CAN BE IMPACTED BY HIGH NIGHTTIME TEMPERATURES. IF YOUR BODY TEMPERATURE CAN'T COOL OVERNIGHT…HEAT ILLNESS RISKS GO UP.
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NEW TOOLS LIKE HEAT RISK CAN PROVIDE YOU ADDITIONAL INFORMATION WHEN PLANNING OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES. WE'LL SHARE HEAT RISK MAPS AS PART OF OUR FORECASTS AS NEEDED THROUGH THE SUMMER. I'LL ALSO HAVE A LINK TO THE CDC'S HEAT RISK WEBSITE IN MY WEB ARTICLE AT KOAA DOT COM.
METEOROLOGIST CASEY DORN
NEWS FIVE
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