Heat, humidity grip E. Coast as Midwest gets slight reprieve
BOSTON — The East Coast on Sunday sweated through humidity on what was expected to be the final day of an extreme heat wave as organizers in Boston canceled a road race, Delaware Civil War re- enactors got the day off and the New York Police Department implored residents to take it easy.
“Sunday has been canceled,” the NYPD jokingly tweeted. “Stay indoors, nothing to see here. Really, we got this.”
The central part of the country, meanwhile, enjoyed some relief as a cold front moved steadily southward and eastward across the country, bringing down the temperatures. But the cooler weather settling in Monday and Tuesday is also bringing severe storms packed with powerful winds and heavy rains that have already caused damage in the Midwest. The National Weather Service warns flash flooding might be possible in some areas.
From the Carolinas to Maine, daytime highs reached the upper 90s Sunday. Coupled with high humidity, temperatures felt as hot as 110 degrees in places.
“There’s no point being out,” Washington bus driver Ramieka Darby remarked while taking a quick break amid temperatures
of nearly 100 degrees.
Nearby, Jack Ogten was among a steady stream of tourists milling around outside the White House. Undeterred by the stifling heat, the resident of the Netherlands joked he’d lost about 22 pounds from sweating after just one day of sightseeing.
In New York City, where all eyes were on the power grid even before the hot weather following a Manhattan blackout last weekend, electricity company Con Ed reported roughly 17,000 customers were without power due to scattered outages early Sunday evening, the vast majority in the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens.
Con Ed said it reduced voltage by 8% in those areas to maintain service as repairs are made and asked those customers to turn off nonessential appliances to conserve power.
The city also directed office buildings to set thermostats no lower than 78 degrees through Sunday to reduce strain on its electrical grid. A day earlier, a commemoration of the 1969 moon landing planned for Times Square and an outdoor festival featuring soccer star Megan Rapinoe and musician John Legend were both nixed.
The National Weather Service reported high temperatures for July 20 were recorded Saturday at its weather stations in Atlantic City, N. J.; New York City, Westfield, Mass.; Manchester, N. H.; and Wallops Island, Va.
And in many parts of the country, it’s not expected to get much better when the sun goes down: temperatures are expected to remain at or above the high 70s overnight.
Meanwhile, parts of the Midwest are dealing with the effects of damaging winds and rain that swooped in with the cold front that’s breaking up the heat wave.
In Milwaukee, utility crews restored power to more than 48,000 customers in the eastern part of the state. But about 56,000 customers were still without power Sunday after more than 700 wires, 50 power poles, and over 600 trees or branches were taken down in thunderstorms, officials said.
In Michigan, power might not be restored for everyone until Tuesday.
Utility companies DTE Energy and Consumers Energy said roughly 500,000 customers are still without power after thousands of power lines were downed in a storm that was the worst to hit the region since 2017.