A local man was part of a landscaping crew, and wasn’t feeling well because he had used a little meth that morning. His coworkers told him to go take a break in the truck with the air conditioner running. He crawled in and passed out without starting the truck. That day, the heat index was 105 degF. Inside of that uncooled truck, it was much higher. An hour later, they went to check on him and found him unresponsive and covered in vomit, so they called 911. The ambulance crew rushed him to the ED, and he went into cardiac arrest during the trip to the hospital.
When he arrived at the hospital, his rectal temperature was 110 degrees F (43.3 C). We worked him for an hour and a half. I was in charge of getting fluids into him. I pressure infused 6 liters of refrigerated Normal Saline into him. He was covered in cold blankets and had a fan blowing on him. We finally got his rectal temp down to 100degF, and got pulses back. He wasn’t even 30 years old, and wound up dying later that day of the heat stroke that literally cooked his brain.
I saw Graybeard’s post about the hot days of summer, and I will second that. The people who live here know that anything needing to be done outside is best done before 11 am, when the thermometer typically breaks 90 deg. It isn’t the temperature, it’s the dew point. As of right now, the dew point here in Sector Ocho is 73 degF. Yeah, we do this every year. Here we are complaining about humidity from back in 2016.
The dew point temperature is the temperature at which the air can no longer hold all of its water vapor, and some of the water vapor must condense into liquid water. At 100% relative humidity, the dew point temperature and the air temperature are the same, and clouds or fog can begin to form. Dew point is the best indicator of comfort in a hot climate. Once the dew point of the air exceeds 66 degrees Fahrenheit or so, the air begins to feel hot and uncomfortably stuffy. The reason for this, is that your perspiration can not evaporate to cool you off.
The thermometer temperature and the dew point are used to calculate the heat index (feels like) temperature. Any heat index above 125 degrees is likely to produce heat stroke, which is deadly.
Here in Florida, there are 4 seasons:
Hot: March through May
F’ing Hot: June through mid September
Still Hot: Mid September through Mid November
Snow Bird: Mid November through February
When it’s hot, you get your outside work done in the morning, then stay in the air conditioning until at least 4:30 in the afternoon, when the afternoon thunderstorms come calling. That is what we do from mid June until about the middle of September.
3 Comments
Robert · August 1, 2023 at 7:34 am
I feel very sad after reading that story. Sad for the patient, sad for your crew who worked on him.
You cannot save them all. But it seems that you don’t let any of them slip away without a hard fight.
Thank you.
oldvet50 · August 1, 2023 at 8:36 am
I, too, read Graybeard’s post and the comments were hilarious. One commented that cold weather was more dangerous because if your car brokedown in an isolated area, you could die. The reply, from a Californian, was you could die from the heat if you were locked in your car on a hot day. I have been locked out of my car before, but never locked in….but I don’t live in California.
EN2 SS · August 1, 2023 at 8:16 pm
I read earlier about a dipshit Tesla owner that was locked inside his garage, inside his Tesla for twenty minutes in the heat. The main battery isn’t the one that runs the accessory electronics, there is a little 12 volt one for that. Seems he is too f’n stupid to read his owners manual and find out about the emergency door handle, a manual one not electric, under the armrest. Darwin almost had to award another trophy. Damn.
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