Climate Impact Report – 6/26

June 26, 2024

Key Facts Of The Day 6/26

Devastated communities across the Midwest are picking up the pieces after days of flooding that destroyed homes, roads, and public facilities.
- Entire communities in Minnesota were submerged Tuesday.
- The Rapidan dam is facing its second-worst flood surge, behind the 1965 flood that disabled it for 10 years.
- Aerial drone footage showed entire houses underwater in South Dakota, with roads turned to rubble and cars floating away.
- FEMA teams are set to visit six counties affected by floods in Iowa.
- President Joe Biden declared a major disaster in the state and made federal funds available to individuals and businesses Tuesday.
A level 2 of 5 risk of severe thunderstorms is in place from parts of Ohio and Kentucky to New York, New Jersey, and Delaware.
A few thunderstorms will develop by mid-afternoon in parts of Ohio and western New York and expand south and east.

As of Wednesday, 42 large active wildfires have burned 184,464 acres across AK, AZ, CA, CO, FL, MT, NM, NC, OR, UT, WA, and WY. This year to date, 20,457 wildfires have burned 2,243,018 acres across the country.
In Alaska, 22 fires have burned 95,778 acres as of Wednesday.
In Arizona, 2 fires have burned 4,164 acres as of Wednesday.
In California, 4 fires have burned 40,733 acres as of Wednesday.
In Colorado, 1 fire has burned 495 acres as of Wednesday.
In Florida, 1 fire has burned 833 acres as of Wednesday.
In New Mexico, 3 fires have burned 28,007 acres as of Wednesday.
In North Carolina, 1 fire has burned 545 acres as of Wednesday.
In Oregon, 3 fires have burned 2,414 acres as of Wednesday.
In Utah, 1 fire has burned 2,417 acres as of Wednesday.
In Washington, 2 fires have burned 7,688 acres as of Wednesday.

On Tuesday, Puerto Rico issued an island-wide heat advisory for the first time as power outages persist.
- Heat indexes were expected to reach up to 114 degrees Fahrenheit along most of Puerto Rico’s coastal areas on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Hospitals in many states are seeing extremely high rates of heat-related emergencies, and the regions hardest hit by heat illnesses are not always the ones seeing the highest temperatures.