Two new articles in the past few days highlight the heat and drought threats.

• NOAA said July 2012 was the hottest month ever in U.S. history–even out-doing the Dust Bowl years.
• Heat can be deadly, as noted in an article by HSWire, August 7.  A few excerpts are included here:

Disasters: Forget blizzards and hurricanes, heat waves are deadliest

Tornadoes, blizzards, and hurricanes get most of our attention because their destructive power makes for imagery the media cannot ignore; for sheer killing power, however, heat waves do in far more people than even the most devastating hurricane; Hurricane Katrina and its floods, which devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in 2005, exacted a death toll of 1,836 people; the heat wave which enveloped Europe during the course of three excruciating weeks in August 2003 of that year, killed an estimated 70,000 people

Lately a lot of people have been comparing the current U.S. drought situation to the Dust Bowl, which occurred in the 1930s. . For a full account of that disaster see  chapter 3  of  “Emergency Management; the American Experience, 1900-2010.”  It is available from The Disaster Bookstore, our sponsor.