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An intense heatwave across the US west has brought unusually warm temperatures to the region – some of the highest of the season – and broken heat records.

Millions of Americans from Phoenix to Los Angeles to Seattle are under heat alerts. Even before this latest bout of extreme weather, which began on Wednesday and is expected to last through the weekend, summer 2024 was already considered the hottest summer on record.

In California, the desert city of Indio saw its hottest 5 September at 121F (49.4C), breaking a previous record of 120F from 2020, while Palm Springs tied its heat record for the day at 121F. Palm Springs recorded its all-time high of 124F in July.

The Los Angeles region has not yet broken any records – although Burbank, a few miles to the north of downtown Los Angeles, tied for its all-time high of 114F. But the area is bracing for a days-long stretch of triple-digit temperatures. The temperature in Los Angeles on Thursday reached 102F (38.9C), and Friday was expected to see similarly high temperatures in three figures.

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A potentially record-setting heat wave is expected to drive temperatures across the western U.S. into the triple digits as it builds this week, triggering warnings as authorities set up cooling shelters throughout the region.

Millions of people from southwestern Oregon through California, parts of Arizona and western Nevada will be under excessive heat warnings Tuesday through Friday.

The highest temperatures are expected in Furnace Creek in Death Valley National Park, where temperatures could reach 120 degrees this week. Meanwhile, in southern California's Palm Springs area and the Coachella Valley, afternoon highs could hit 118 degrees.

Federal forecasters said major cities including Los Angeles, Phoenix, Las Vegas and Portland, Oregon, were expected to surpass 100 degrees, according to the weather service. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said that emergency personnel have begun preparing for the heat wave and that authorities are setting up cooling centers around the city.

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More than one dozen park-goers have died in Grand Canyon national park this summer, with three perishing in just over one week in August, as weather extremes linked to climate change make for increasingly dangerous conditions.

With 14 deaths reported in the park this season, total fatalities have already almost reached the annual average of 15, the Hill reported.

One hiker who died, Chenoa Nickerson, was last seen on 22 August above the confluence of Havasu Creek and the Colorado River, National Park Service officials said. Nickerson was reported missing after a flash flood hit the Havasu canyon, and her body was found on 25 August.

The Havasupai tribe reported catastrophic flash floods, which damaged “the main trail to Supai Village, trails within the village, tribal member homes, public utility systems and the campgrounds,” on the day she went missing. An 80-year-old man died when his boat capsized on 25 August, plunging him into the Colorado River, per the Hill.

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Families who built their small farms around riding their horses, raising cattle and holding family fish fries in rural Johnson County face an uncertain future because of what they’re finding in the pasture or stock tank: dead or deformed cattle, horses and fish.

The past two years have been a “nightmare” for the family farmers, and they point to “forever chemicals” found in fertilizer made from sewage as the reason.

The five farmers who live outside of Grandview — James Farmer, Robin Alessi, Patsy Schultz, and Karen and Tony Coleman — have been embroiled in a complex legal battle with the EPA and fertilizer manufacturer Synagro Technologies Inc. and its Texas subsidiary since February, when they filed a lawsuit against Synagro in Circuit Court of Baltimore County and one against the EPA in Washington.

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Hoof it through the national parks of the western United States—Joshua Tree, the Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon—and breathe deep the pristine air. These are unspoiled lands, collectively a great American conservation story.

Yet an invisible menace is actually blowing through the air and falling via raindrops: Microplastic particles, tiny chunks (by definition, less than 5 millimeters long) of fragmented plastic bottles and microfibers that fray from clothes, all pollutants that get caught up in Earth’s atmospheric systems and deposited in the wilderness.

The National Hurricane Center is tracking two disturbances in the Atlantic Ocean, the agency said in its latest advisory issued Wednesday.

In the western Atlantic, an area of low pressure located a few hundred miles southeast of Bermuda is producing a "small area of disorganized shower and thunderstorm activity," the NHC said. However, dry air and strong upper-level winds "are expected to limit additional development of this system during the next day or so."

The hurricane center now gives the disturbance a "near 0% chance" of development in the next seven days.

In the central Tropical Atlantic, the NHC said "an area of disorganized showers is associated with a tropical wave. Some slow development of this system is possible this weekend into early next week while it moves westward to west-northwestward at 10 to 15 mph," the hurricane center said in its 2:00 p.m. forecast update.

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A landslide cut a path down a steep, thickly forested hillside and crashed into several homes in Ketchikan, killing one person and injuring three in the latest such disaster to strike mountainous southeast Alaska.

The landslide Sunday afternoon prompted a mandatory evacuation of 60 nearby homes in the city, a popular cruise ship stop along the famed Inside Passage in the Alaska panhandle. The slope remained unstable Monday, and authorities said that state and local geologists were arriving to assess the potential for further slides.

Four homes were critically damaged, officials said, and homes next to the slide area were still being assessed. Several homes and businesses reported flooding.

Last November, six people — including a family of five — were killed when a landslide destroyed two homes in Wrangell, about 100 miles (161 kilometers) to the north. Torrential rains were blamed for landslides that killed two people in Haines in 2020 and three people in Sitka in 2015.

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A heatwave has left US midwest states confronting what may be some of the most sweltering days the region has seen this summer, with 55 million people included in alerts over the conditions.

A late-season high-pressure system over cities such as Chicago; Des Moines, Iowa; and Topeka, Kansas, has left them experiencing rare “extreme heat” for a long period of time, “with little to no overnight relief”, according to the National Weather Service.

States in the region have set up several public cooling centers in preparation for the dangerous heat.

An air quality alert is in effect in states including Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio and Tennessee, where heat indices are forecast to reach 105F (40.5C) to 115F (46.1C). Experts recommended residents to limit prolonged outdoor activity, especially those with chronic respiratory illnesses.

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