Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 14, 1995 TAG: 9507140067
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The system was moving eastward and it was expected to stay the weekend over the eastern half of the nation.
``I keep a water jug real close,'' said Larry Miller, a farmer in Thompsonville, Ill., who spent the day on a tractor spraying his soybean crop. ``And for me, I perspire a lot, so I have to keep something to wipe my eyes. It's hot, but you just endure it. The things that we're doing today have got to be done today.''
Parts of Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Illinois neared 100 degrees. Chicago recorded its hottest temperature ever, 106 degrees, breaking the record of 105 set in 1934.
By afternoon, La Crosse, Wis., tied the all-time high of 108, last reached in 1936. The heat and humidity made it feel like 129 around noon in Appleton, Wis.
That followed a night that brought little relief. In La Crosse, the mercury dropped to only 81; the old record of 78 had stood since 1932.
Mansfield, Ohio, had reached 90 degrees, tying the record set in 1974. Milwaukee hit 96 before noon. Temperatures hit triple digits throughout southern Minnesota, and it was 101 degrees in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
With the steamy front moving east, the Washington Monument was closed Thursday for the first time ever because the air conditioning system failed and temperatures reached over 100 inside.
Expect most of Virginia to feel ready to boil this weekend.
The National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for today and Saturday for the Piedmont region of the state and points east. The heat advisory indicates a heat index of 105 degrees or higher.
The western part of Virginia will have slightly lower temperatures thanks to higher elevations.
``It's still going to be oppressively hot and humid,'' said Jim White of the Weather Service office in Blacksburg. ``Just a little bit warmer and we'll probably be included" in the heat advisory.
The weekend forecast for Roanoke and vicinity is for temperatures in the mid-90s with heat index values near 100 degrees. The index factors in the effect of humidity.
Near Nebraska City, Neb., 15 cars of a 98-car freight train derailed Wednesday. No one was hurt. Union Pacific spokesman John Bromley said the rail ``kinks'' or buckles when it gets too hot.
Of the people who died, four were in Kansas City, Mo.: a 36-year-old woman whose apartment reached 130 degrees, two elderly women whose homes lacked air conditioning or fans, and a 77-year-old man whose home reached 110 degrees. Two people were found dead in overheated apartments in Chicago, a roofer pouring tar in Texas also died, and the death of a Nebraska cancer patient was hastened by heat stroke.
In Louisville, Ky., on Thursday, a 51-year-old man was found dead from the heat in a downtown housing project and a 51/2-month-old girl died after being left in a locked Jeep in mid-90s heat for about eight hours.
Brian Swett, the father of the infant, Bailey Marie, was charged with murder after a passerby spotted the girl in a University of Louisville parking lot.
``We're working on the assumption that he forgot,'' said Officer Aaron Graham. ``The child was supposed to have been dropped off at day care, but it was not.''
Thousands of cattle and turkeys have died of the heat in Iowa. Many steer carcasses were decaying and bursting before trucks could take them away to rendering plants to be turned into feed, grease and other products.
``With a feedlot of a thousand cattle, it isn't easy to find shade,'' said Don Baker of the Iowa State University Extension Office.
At a northwestern Iowa turkey farm, officials said the heat killed nearly 120,000 birds in the 24-hour period ending Thursday night.
In Chicago, 22 children were taken to hospitals to be treated for dehydration and heat exhaustion when they became faint and nauseous on their way home from a suburban water park. The school bus had sealed windows and the air conditioning wasn't working.
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB