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This kind of thing really bothers me since it's just not that difficult to make extreme heat survivable if you've got access to water, even easier for water and

This kind of thing really bothers me since it's just not that difficult to make extreme heat survivable if you've got access to water, even easier for water and power. But parking yourself in a trailer is not a good approach. They're so poorly insulated it's basically a solar oven until the sun goes down, like being trapped in a hot car. Even with working AC, that's just going to cost you quite a lot in power since the heat keeps coming in too easily. If I were stuck living in such a trailer park without funds, I'd likely spend my summers outside in swim trunks, under an umbrella, with a water-mister+fan aimed at me. They even sell such things integrated for the purpose, but you can trivially improvise something. A Moab bar+cafe I visited in July had an industrial mister+fan the size of a refrigerator that cooled the entire bar despite having one whole wall of roll-top doors open to the >100F outside. If you've crossed the wet-bulb temperature due to extreme humidity though, that's a different ball game. TFA didn't mention if that was a factor here, I don't think Texas had it that bad humidity-wise in the recent heat waves, did they?

nocoiner 3y ago
W.r.t. your last paragraph: nope, nowhere close.
doodlebugging 3y ago
>I don't think Texas had it that bad humidity-wise in the recent heat waves, did they? They were in Harris County so that is a coastal county where temperatures during the summer are oppressively hot due to high humidity. Back in June when these people passed, the humidity and unseasonably high heat combined to make it very dangerous for people with health problems to be outside during the daytime. Even healthy people were urged to stay indoors due to the high heat index. It gets nasty on the Gulf Coast and Baytown, where they lived, is a refinery town so the air quality is bad anyway.
LispSporks22 3y ago
> TFA didn't mention if that was a factor here, I don't think Texas had it that bad humidity-wise in the recent heat waves, did they? It’s pretty bad. Harris county is humid. If you’ve ever been in Houston in spring/summer, you know it’s like living in someone’s armpit. Air conditioners are the only reason it’s even livable at this population level in the south.
- tmm84 3y ago
  I remember just the wind blowing sometimes feeling like the exhaust of car idling. I worked at night and outside for a few years. I got to the point I stopped sweating because my body got used to the heat. After working in an office for a couple of years I lost my ability to stand the heat like I did.
sn9 3y ago
Houston in particular is one of the most humid cities in the country, with 100% humidity a common and inevitable experience for its inhabitants. The last few months have been even hotter than usual, so combined with even >70% humidity, it's been sufficiently lethal that going without AC for long is a death sentence (especially for the vulnerable like the elderly).

nocoiner 3y ago

W.r.t. your last paragraph: nope, nowhere close.

doodlebugging 3y ago

>I don't think Texas had it that bad humidity-wise in the recent heat waves, did they? They were in Harris County so that is a coastal county where temperatures during the summer are oppressively hot due to high humidity. Back in June when these people passed, the humidity and unseasonably high heat combined to make it very dangerous for people with health problems to be outside during the daytime. Even healthy people were urged to stay indoors due to the high heat index. It gets nasty on the Gulf Coast and Baytown, where they lived, is a refinery town so the air quality is bad anyway.

LispSporks22 3y ago

> TFA didn't mention if that was a factor here, I don't think Texas had it that bad humidity-wise in the recent heat waves, did they? It’s pretty bad. Harris county is humid. If you’ve ever been in Houston in spring/summer, you know it’s like living in someone’s armpit. Air conditioners are the only reason it’s even livable at this population level in the south.

tmm84 3y ago
I remember just the wind blowing sometimes feeling like the exhaust of car idling. I worked at night and outside for a few years. I got to the point I stopped sweating because my body got used to the heat. After working in an office for a couple of years I lost my ability to stand the heat like I did.

sn9 3y ago

Houston in particular is one of the most humid cities in the country, with 100% humidity a common and inevitable experience for its inhabitants. The last few months have been even hotter than usual, so combined with even >70% humidity, it's been sufficiently lethal that going without AC for long is a death sentence (especially for the vulnerable like the elderly).