Heat is testing the limits of human survivability. Here’s how it kills CNN  Laura Paddison, Jen Christensen, Mary Gilbert, Henry Zeris, Yukari Schrickel,Lou Robinson andWay MulleryMon July 29, 2024 Philip Kreycik should have survived his run. In the summer of 2021, the 37-year-old ultra-marathon runner used an app to plot a roughly 8-mile loop through Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park in California, a huge stretch of parkland threaded with trails. On the morning of July 10, as temperatures crept into the 90s, Kreycik set off from his car, leaving his phone and water locked inside. He started at a lightning pace — eating up the first 5 miles, each one in less than six minutes. Then things started to go wrong. GPS data from his smartwatch showed he slowed dramatically. He veered off the trail. His steps became erratic. By this time, the temperature was above 100 degrees Fahrenheit. When Kreycik failed to show up for a family lunch, his wife contacted the police. It took more than three weeks to find his body. An autopsy showed no sign of traumatic injuries. Police confirmed Kreycik likely experienced a medical emergency related to the heat.The tragedy is sadly far from unique; extreme heat is turning ordinary activities deadly.

People have died taking a stroll in the midday sun, on a family hike in a national park, at an outdoor Taylor Swift concert, and even sweltering in their homes without air conditioning. During this year’s Hajj pilgrimage in June, around 1,300 people perished as temperatures pushed above 120 degrees Fahrenheit in Mecca. Heat is the deadliest type of extreme weather, and the human-caused climate crisis is making heat waves more severe and prolonged. Add humidity into the mix, and conditions in some places are approaching the limits of human survivability — the point at which our bodies simply cannot adapt.“We’ve essentially weaponized summer,” said Matthew Huber, a climate professor at Purdue University.....read on

Inside a heat chamber....Kreycik had almost everything on his side when he went running on that hot day: he was extremely fit, relatively young and was an experienced runner.While some people are more vulnerable to heat than others, including the very old and young, no one is immune — not even the world’s top athletes.......read on.   https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/29/climate/heat-survivability-health-death-intl