It seems that it's too hot in Phoenix these days for airplanes to fly, or at least that's what USA Today tells us.

Extreme heat affects a plane's ability to take off. Hot air is less dense than cold air, and the hotter the temperature, the more speed a plane needs to lift off. A runway might not be long enough to allow a plane to achieve the necessary extra speed.

The Phoenix area is going to experience heat in excess of 115 degrees for a while. This is not merely uncomfortable; it's damned near uninhabitable. But at least, unlike Portugal, Phoenix isn't burning down at the moment. From the BBC:

The week's highest temperatures of around 38C (100F) are expected on Tuesday and together with windy conditions could reignite fires already quelled. Civil protection officials say although 70% of the fire is under control, what remains is a source "of great concern". At least 64 people have died in the fires since Saturday.The latest of the victims was identified as a 40-year-old firefighter who died in hospital. Many died inside their cars or a short distance away from them as they tried to flee. More than 130 other people have been injured.

Here is where I remind you that we have a president* committed, at least rhetorically, to reviving the dead coal industry, and who was loudly applauded by the members of his party—and quietly applauded by the CEOs who own them—for pulling the US out of the Paris climate accords, and who installed at the Environmental Protection Agency an extraction industry sublet who doesn't even believe that Carbon dioxide and climate change have anything to do with each other. In turn, this cluck appointed a former lobbyist for various polluters to head the enforcement division of the EPA, which, in any case, is savaged in the new proposed federal budget.

Hugely anomalous and destructive weather events are going to be the new normal in no small part because a hugely anomalous and destructive political event took place last November. Some day, that whole election may be looked on as a crime against humanity.

Oh yeah, Louisiana has the first bullseye of the season painted on it.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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