Paramedics welcome cooler weekend weather
Paramedic Stuart Brideaux said he's never seen a spike in emergency cases like the one fuelled by a ferocious heat wave broiling Western Canada.
The Calgary EMS spokesman said his colleagues have been responding to about two dozen heat-related calls a day since temperatures consistently in the mid-30 C range settled on Calgary earlier this week. “I've never seen such an obvious upward trend of a particular call type,” said Brideaux.
Others with heat-related symptoms might have been transported to hospital by alternate means, he said.
Like many Calgarians seeking refuge from the remorseless heat, Brideaux said he'll be happy to see cooler temperatures this weekend, with the mercury expected to drop to 24 C on Saturday and 21 C on Sunday, accompanied by showers.
For the first day this week, the temperature is expected to fall short of 30 C on Friday, with a forecast high of 29 C.
The paramedic said he's grateful Calgary dodged the fate of B.C.'S Lower Mainland, where emergency officials there say hundreds have died due to excessive heat.
Brideaux said it's hard to say why a similar toll hasn't occurred in Calgary, though he added the higher humidity on the West Coast could be a factor.
But the weather has kept Calgary first-responders busy with dozens of rescues of those seeking relief in the city's rivers and lakes.
Calgarians more directly affected by the heat that's repeatedly smashed same-day records this week have been those suffering heat exhaustion.
Some of those patients are homeless individuals, while some are seniors sweltering in their homes and others succumb from exertion, said Brideaux.
“Well after temperatures peak at about 3 or 4 p.m., we see two-thirds of those patients,” he said.
“At nighttime, it only goes down to around 20 C, so you can hardly call those overnight lows.”
Paramedics and other medical staff, he said, have to contend with all those extra heat-related cases on top of the other summertime injuries and illnesses, added Brideaux. “Those other calls haven't subsided,” he said.
According to Environment Canada, the hottest day this week in Calgary was Tuesday, when the temperature hit 36.3 C, easily surpassing the record for June 29 — 34.4 C set in 1896.
By mid-afternoon on Thursday, the temperature had reached 35.4 C, well past the previous record of 32.8 C recorded in 1924.
Scientists have long said human-induced climate change is contributing to the intensity of the heat waves and making them more frequent.
One air conditioning installer said he's never experienced such an overwhelming demand.
“There's nothing available, nothing to buy — we had 15 units in the warehouse and that's it,” said Ivan Gouniavyi of Air Force Heating and Air Conditioning. “I've never seen anything like this and I've been doing this for 20 years.”
Demand among Calgarians for air conditioning, he said, rises every year, with larger numbers of orders coming increasingly earlier in the winter.