The first week of summer in Isle of Wight and Surry counties will be dangerously hot.

A heat dome making its way across much of the United States is expected to bring several days of triple-digit temperatures with little to no relief in sight.

“It’s going to be a prolonged heat event,” Mike Dutter, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Wakefield station, told the Times.

A heat dome forms when a large high-pressure system traps hot air and allows it to build up, Dutter said. 

“We’re expecting the heat to develop really starting on Sunday,” Dutter said.

A June 20 NWS forecast calls for temperatures in Smithfield to reach 95 degrees on Sunday, June 22, 97 degrees on Monday and 98 degrees on Tuesday.

In Surry, it could be even hotter, with a forecasted high of 97 degrees Sunday and consecutive days of 100-degree highs Monday and Tuesday. The heat index is expected to rise to 110 degrees by Tuesday and remain in the 100- to 105-degree range through June 27, Dutter said.

The heat index, also called the apparent or “feels like” temperature, measures the impact of high heat combined with high humidity on the human body. According to the NWS website, when the body gets too hot, it reacts by sweating. If the perspiration isn’t able to evaporate due to the air already being saturated with high humidity, the body can’t regulate its temperature and symptoms of heat exhaustion and heat stroke set in quicker.

“Stay indoors when you can,” Dutter said.

If you need to work outside, take precautions such as drinking a lot of fluids, even if you’re not thirsty, and taking frequent breaks, Dutter said.

Overnight lows in the mid to upper 70s won’t bring much relief and the next chance of rain isn’t until June 26 or June 27, Dutter said.

 

How common are heat domes?

“It happens during the summertime around here,” Dutter said. “It’s not atypical, but it certainly can be dangerous.”

The U.S. saw a heat dome in mid-June 2024. That year marked Virginia’s driest June on record and its eighth warmest in 130 years, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data. 

A 2024 study linked the length and intensity of a West Coast heat dome in June 2021 to climate change.

According to the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, 2024 was the warmest year since global recordkeeping began in 1850.

According to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency data, the average number of heat waves per year and the average length of the annual heat wave season have each increased threefold since the 1960s.

According to NOAA, atmospheric carbon dioxide, which absorbs and radiates heat, has increased by 2.6 parts per million per year from 2015 through 2024. By adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, people are amplifying the greenhouse effect, with carbon dioxide alone responsible for about 80% of the total heating influence of all human-produced greenhouse gases since 1990, according to NOAA’s climate.gov website.