Not trying to sound salty, but just for general reference. A heatwave in the UK starts somewhere around 23C. At 20C they are already anouncing in the stations for people to carry water at all times.
I always love the super Internet badasses from warm climates who laugh at notherners for complaining it's too hot at "normal" temps. I'm willing to bet SoCal doesn't hit -30. Your body is used to one small temperature range all year, our range swings wildly and we have to cope with both extremes.
Nah, but go ahead and laugh when 80F is considered hot. We laugh in our tank tops and shorts when you guys say 50F is cold.
I did a crit bike race in Melbourne in ~42c a few years back; it's amazing what you can get conditioned to. I did put electrolytes in my hydration though..
I went back to the Norwegian summer following the summer of Black Saturday in 2009, where we got a few 46c days. That was a shocking summer even by Australian standards. When I got to Norway it was around 35c - unusually hot for them; my family really couldn't handle it. I just found it mild and pleasant... they all looked at me weird.
The reverse was true when I moved to Australia many years before that. Arriving in June, coming straight out of the Norway winter I couldn't understand why Melburnians were complaining so much .. to me the "winter" felt hot!
Of course I also complained that they should close the windows in the office because of the road noise, only to discover that double glazed windows aren't standard everywhere. They really don't know how to build houses here.
I've seen below freezing point temps riding to work now so they really ought to introduce some proper building codes ... it's just sad how much energy is wasted pumping heat through the metre wide gaps under the main doors. Really, Australian builders have NFI about energy.
And if this were 'eight low-tech ways to keep warm during snowpocalypse' then you could be a super internet badass too and brag about how we're such big babies about -30
Gah, Chicago was fun with -30F in the winter and easily 90+ in the summer. I'll take my Bay Area weather now, 45-85 is nice. Although, I still go camping in the mountains and sleep outside down to 15F whenever I can.
Your houses are also made of tracing paper, which don't retain any heat, and have air con. Our houses are made of brick and insulation and are practically giant heatsinks. Being 23-25C inside and outside and absolutely no way to cool off is hell.
23C inside is comfy. Our office AC is set to 21 and I need to wear a hoodie indoors due to the AC draught. It starts getting unpleasant around 26C. At home, however, it's 31C on the second floor of our townhouse, and we're investigating installing AC.
> Being 23-25C inside and outside and absolutely no way to cool off is hell.
You are discounting the personal factor. I'm 28C inside and 36C outside. Pretty comfy for me and not running Air conditioner yet. In fact I set the Aircon at 20-23 most of the time. A hot day would be 40+ outside.
it's been over thirty yesterday and today, it's virtually record temperatures for us and almost no one has air conditioning or even much in the way of fans.
Fans...you buy them and they'll probably last you 40 yrs given a 2-3 day use a year :). Probably not worth doing many home renovations to deal with the heat, unless it happens yearly.
Just suck it up, 30c is manageable, even if you're used to it. any humidity? That is the worst
You realize they put out the warnings for a reason, right? Like... people die when temperatures get that hot in northern regions. People actually die. But nah, just suck it up right? Suck it up granny, quit yer dying over there and just buy a fan!
It's 30 °C which is still ridiculous to be called a "heat wave" from the point of view of most humans on this planet. And 15 °C overnight is considered "too warm", really?
> These thresholds vary by region, but an average threshold temperature is 30 °C by day and 15 °C overnight for at least two consecutive days.
As a German, I would say anything over 38 °C during the day and over 20 °C overnight is a "heat wave", and I think a lot of people down south, maybe most humans on this planet, may not consider this too warm. I remember visiting the Emirates for a week during summer... or working in the kitchen of a summer camp for disabled people in Oakhurst, New Jersey during the summer, without an AC in my room. The camp's kitchen's giant refrigerator room was a favorite meeting place for anyone who had access. The only way to sleep was with a fan running at full speed blowing right at me. Maybe that experience shifted my view of what a "heat wave" is. Oh, and in the Emirates they have "cooled swimming pools". I thought it was just a joke, but no, they really artificially cool the water of their swimming pools. I went into the Gulf water - for half a minute, then I went straight into the cooled swimming pool that I had scoffed at. Having grown up in East Germany and only knowing the Baltic I never knew that the sea could ever be too warm even to enter for more than a minute.
Yesterday or the day before, reading UK news (BBC or The Guardian) as I often do, I saw the announcement of the "heat wave" and the warning of temperatures over 30 °C(!) and thought exactly the same as OP, even if he got the exact number wrong.
The UK is usually very humid too when it's hot so the heat index (the 'feels like' temperature) is much higher. For example 30°C could 'feel like' 38°C if the humidity is at 80%. Also terrible if you are sweating and it can't evaporate.
And 15 °C overnight is considered "too warm", really?
In some places, buildings are designed on the assumption that temperatures at night will be significantly cooler, and give the building an opportunity to shed heat collected during the day. When that assumption is violated, the building remains hot and continues getting hotter each day, which is dangerous to people inside.
I live in one such building. It takes one week of high temperatures and it remains hot inside no matter the temperatures, it takes a week of cool weather. That has nothing to do with the topic though, and 15 °C at night is not a heat wave no matter how bad the design.
By the way, I found by personal experiment that all it takes is one layer of something like cloth in front of the stone to prevent if from heating up. I completely cover my large balcony on the outside now, including the thick stones. In all previous years they always stored to much heat during the day that the balcony remained hot well until morning, heat radiating from all sides, making it almost unbearable to go there (or to open the wide door) even when the outside air temperatures had dropped below 20 °C. The difference this summer is huge. So it does not take anything fancy or expensive at all, just prevent direct sun exposure of those heat sink surfaces (like solid concrete).
I recall there being unique reasons of a general lack of insulation and/or circulation built into UK housing, since that value seems ridiculously low. I even found https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... (p. 40/41) to corroborate the numbers somewhat.
Central Kansas is Midwest too, and not by the great lakes. Still has crazy temperatures though. Our AC is usually set to 23C also, but I find that too cold when I come inside from 38C weather...
one of those things I can't help but chuckle at. 73 F (23 C) is like my ideal temperature!