Facts Of The Day 6/30

Hurricanes

• Hurricane Enrique was downgraded to a tropical storm on Tuesday after bringing rain and damaging flooding and mudslides to the coast of southwestern Mexico on Monday.
  • In Mexico’s Guerrero State, Enrique killed two people, damaged at least 207 homes and washed out bridges and roads.
  • Tropical Storm Enrique is expected to make landfall on the Baja Peninsula Wednesday morning, bringing between 2-4 inches of rain with isolated maximum amounts of 6 inches.
• Tropical Storm Danny was downgraded to a post-tropical storm on Tuesday morning.
• After heavy rains, the city of Dearborn, Michigan, received 700 calls reporting flood damage to homes and more than 50,000 DTE Energy customers were without power as of Wednesday morning.
  • A line worker died on Tuesday after coming in contact with a wire.

Wildfires

• There are currently 44 large wildfires active across AZ, CA, CO, FL, ID, MT, NV, NM, UT, and WA. Nationally, 667,566 acres have burned so far this year. 
• President Joe Biden will meet with Western governors on Wednesday to discuss wildfire threats and announce new wildfire response initiatives. 
• In California, the Lava Fire has burned through almost 13,300 acres and was 20% containmed as of Tuesday evening. At least 8,000 people have been evacuated from their homes as of Tuesday evening.
• In California, the Tennant Fire in the Klamath National Forest has burned more than 6,000 acres and was 0% contained as of Wednesday morning. Nearby areas are under evacuation orders.
• In Montana, the Robertson Draw Fire burned 29,838 acres and was 65% contained as of Wednesday morning. Closures remain in effect for multiple roads and parts of Custer Gallatin National Forest System lands. 
• In Oregon, Incident 422 near the Redmond Air Center burned 200 acres as of Tuesday afternoon. Nearby areas were ordered to evacuate and flights at the Redmond Airport were diverted, delayed or canceled.

Extreme Heat

• Heatwaves continued to hit the Pacific Northwest and Northeast on Tuesday.
• Maricopa County officials in Arizona are looking at whether 53 deaths during the week of June 12th were heat-related after a record-breaking heat wave.
  • Another 20 heat-related deaths from earlier in the year brings the total to 73 as of June 2021.
• At least 676 people in Washington state visited emergency departments for heat-related symptoms from Friday through Sunday. King County had 40 emergency department visits for heat-related illness on Saturday and 91 on Sunday.
• Oregon reported a total of 506 heat-related emergency department and urgent care center visits as of Wednesday morning. At least 251 of these visits happened on Monday.
• Several parts of Montana are under a heat or fire advisory, warning or watch as of Wednesday morning.
• A heatwave in Connecticut began on Sunday and is expected to continue through Wednesday.
  • Thunderstorms in the area on Tuesday resulted in power outages, with hundreds of homes remaining without power as of Wednesday morning.
• Several U.S. cities broke temperature records over Tuesday and Wednesday morning – including Providence, Rhode Island at 96 degrees, Hartford, Connecticut at 99 degrees, and Spokane, Washington at 109 degrees on Tuesday.

Climate Studies

• A report published in June 2021 found that ads designed to appeal to Republicans increased Republicans’ understanding and effects of climate change by several percentage points.
• A report published in June 2021 found that climate change has caused temperatures and snowfall to significantly decrease in the Greater Yellowstone area since 1950 and that this trend will likely continue through the rest of the century.
• A report published in June 2021 found that amounts of methane from oil and gas wells are higher than suggested by the EPA.