Christopher Enzenauer, 57, sits Monday, July 18, 2023, on a plastic chair to escape triple-digit heat in a cooling center within the Cambridge Recreation Center. Las Vegas has been under an excessive heat warning since last week.
Wednesday, July 19, 2023 | 2 a.m.
Las Vegas heat wave
Christopher Enzenauer was evicted from his home three weeks ago. With no place to live, he said he turned to the streets.
And with that transition came the unavoidable: Surviving in the triple-digit Las Vegas heat.
Finding shade or water is easier said than done, the 57-year-old quickly realized. He said he’s been hospitalized three times with heat-related illnesses that caused him to vomit and faint.
“I get sunburned fast, and it’s exhausting walking around, and it just makes me tired,” Enzenauer said. “I walked only a few blocks like two weeks ago, I sat down and I just passed out. It was that quick; I didn’t even realize.”
Temperatures reached 116 degrees Sunday afternoon at the National Weather Service’s official observation station at Harry Reid International Airport, just shy of Las Vegas’ all-time record of 117 degrees. The National Weather Service here issued an excessive heat warning last week and has since extended it through Saturday. The extended forecast calls for high temperatures no lower than 111 degrees through Sunday.
As Earth’s climate warms due to climate change, NASA warned that heat waves will become more frequent and severe.
One-third of Americans are under some type of heat advisory as the nation braces for heat-related illnesses — and even death. Last month’s heat wave in parts of the South and Midwest killed more than a dozen people.
In Phoenix, about 250 miles southeast of Las Vegas, temperatures hit 110 degrees Tuesday for a record 19th consecutive day. The city has recorded at least 12 heat-related deaths in the first week of July, according to CNN.
The Southern Nevada Health District last week launched a database to track heat deaths in Clark County, reporting seven people have died of heat-related issues since April. Last year, 152 heat-related deaths were reported in Southern Nevada, the health district said.
Pavement burns
With triple-digit weather slamming the Southwest, “pavement burn season” is well in effect, according to doctors at UNLV’s Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine and University Medical Center’s Lions Burn Care Center.
UMC already admitted a few patients with “significant (pavement) burns that some of them are going to require surgery to address,” said Dr. Syed Saquib, medical director for UMC’s Lions Burn Care Center and associate professor of surgery at UNLV’s Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine.
As Nevada’s only verified burn center, the Lions Burn Care Center at UMC treats all types of burns, but sees a spike in injuries resulting from hot pavement in the hot summer months.
In the Las Vegas area, people can get pavement burns as early as May, then the risk rises with the summer temperatures until finally it starts to decrease in September with the arrival of cooler temperatures.
Las Vegas in the summertime often experinces temperatures exceeding 110 degrees, which can cause surfaces like pavement to reach temperatures of 160 or 170 degrees Fahrenheit, Saquib said.
The most dangerous time of the day for pavement burns is between 2 and 4 p.m., when temperatures are at their peak and the sun has been beating down on the pavement for hours, said Dr. Paul Chestovich, an associate professor at UNLV’s Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine.
It can take only a few seconds to suffer a burn, and minutes more could be life-threatening. Some burns can require surgery and skin grafts, Saquib added.
“It’s like a real-life game of ‘the floor is lava,’ ” Chestovich told the Sun last summer. “If you go outside on a hot day in Las Vegas and touch something long enough, it will burn you.”
Those most susceptible to sustaining pavement burns are people with diabetic neuropathy — or a lack of feeling in their feet — homeless people, older individuals or those with medical conditions that cause them to faint, and people who are intoxicated.
And it’s not just pavement that can cause the burns, Saquib said. Hot escalators and other metallic surfaces can pose a risk to people too, and Saquib said he’s seen a few people come through the Burn Care Center with wounds from those sources.
For some people, pavement burns can heal after a week, but healing may require months of care for others. In addition to the physical wounds, burn patients also must recover from the trauma they suffer, Saquib said.
Heat illnesses, deaths on rise
Local heat-related illness and death also are on the rise, health officials said.
The most recent death occurred between June 29 and July 2, and two other heat-related deaths were reported in early June, according to the Southern Nevada Health District.
Heat-related illness occurs when a person’s body temperature rises faster than it can cool, which can lead to heat exhaustion or stroke and damage the brain or other vital organs, officials said.
While heat illness can strike anyone, it mostly affects older adults, young children and those with chronic diseases, according to the health district.
Saquib said heat illness also can increase a person’s risk for sustaining second- or third-degree burns.
“If you sustained heat stroke symptoms and you pass out on the pavement, then the patient has two major problems: the heat stroke and the associated symptoms, which could be life threatening at times, and then the trauma of a pavement burn,” Saquib said. “And both conditions need to be treated in the hospital setting so that way we can save the patient.”
Shelter from the heat
As local jurisdictions work on long-term solutions to provide relief from the heat for residents, they’ve continued to utilize one short-term option for preventing widespread heat illness, injury and death: cooling centers.
The indoor cooling center at the Cambridge Recreation Center in central Las Vegas isn’t supposed to be fancy.
There’s a few long tables against the walls, some folding chairs and plenty of water — both bottles and a jug. Every time someone gets up, you can hear their folding chair scrape against the gray flooring.
A similar arrangement can be found at recreation centers throughout the region hosted by jurisdictions such as Clark County, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas.
The stations, as witnessed at Cambridge, are attracting locals from all walks.
There’s a young couple using the recreation center’s outlets to charge their mobile phones. Another man is asleep on the floor wrapped in various blankets. Even a puppy can be seen taking reprieve from the sun, playfully nudging at whoever gives it attention.
Most of those utilizing the center had wandered in when the day’s temperature reached its peak (the building supervisor said they had found the puppy outside). The dog was given a bowl of water as the center’s staff waited for the county’s Animal Protection Service to pick it up.
Each cooling center in Clark County may look different, but on blistering days like the ones Southern Nevada has experienced recently, anything helps.
“It’s perfect … (I’m) just hanging out in a cool spot; I have internet and everything,” Enzenauer said about the cooling center off Cambridge Street. “We need more of them for people around.”
Catherine Huang Hara, senior management analyst at Clark County and lead of the county’s Continuum of Care, has overseen the operation of the county’s cooling stations for 15 years.
The majority of the stations are recreation sites or libraries operating under the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District, she said. There are also nonprofits, such as the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada, that have their own shelters.
When daily temperatures exceed a certain threshold for a specific month, the local National Weather Service branch notifies the county so it can activate the cooling stations, which are open five to six days a week during daytime hours.
The city of Las Vegas also operates the Courtyard Homeless Resource Center, a shelter that is open to clients seven days a week for 365 days a year. In addition to cooling services, the Courtyard also provides access to medical care, social services, and shower and bathroom facilities, among other services.
“If you’ve ever experienced not having air conditioning, you understand that very quickly, it gets very, very uncomfortable and unmanageable,” Huang Hara said. “It’s important to be able to have access to someplace where you can — free of charge — be able to go in and just sit for a little while or until maybe something changes in your home if you have access to a home.”
Having regular access to shade, water, a fan or air conditioning “goes out the window when you don’t have a place to go,” which makes cooling centers and shelters important resources, said Leslie Carmine, director of community relations at Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada.
Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada’s men’s shelter is one of those places.
The shelter typically operates from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., but Carmine said those hours have been extended to as early as 2:30 p.m. to help unhoused men find respite from the heat — especially those who “are already in a vulnerable state” due to disability or illness.
“Staying out on the sidewalk, the rocks or the pavement gets extremely warm and can cause burns, so it really can be kind of a serious problem for someone who doesn’t have anywhere to go,” Carmine said. “So we kind of evaluated that … just so we can get people out of the sun who are waiting in line.”
Inclement weather — whether monsoon rains or extreme heat — attracts many people to the shelter, Carmine said. Its 400 beds are typically full during these times.
During daily meal services, clients are also ushered into the dining room to get them hydrated and shaded as quickly as possible, she said. There’s even a bottle refill station for people with containers to grab some water before they leave.
Carmine said Southern Nevada has a lot of different resources, like the cooling stations, for people to use during extreme heat events. However, it can be a challenge for some homeless people to find them.
There’s also the possible barrier of them not knowing where to put their belongings, or not being able to enter if they have pets, she added.
Enzenauer “had no idea where to go” to escape the heat before finding a cooling center, and he wasn’t quite sure what he would do when the Cambridge Recreation Center closed at 6 p.m.
His skin is still peeling from the sunburns he’s suffered over the past three weeks, but he’s soaking up as much of the shade as possible while he can.
“For me, I’m gonna be hopefully able to take care of it before then — my problem with my issues with being homeless — but I feel for the people that are still (outside),” Enzenauer said. “I’m sure there’s gonna be some deaths or something.”
Tips to beat the heat
More extreme heat is on the horizon, and health experts are urging all residents in Southern Nevada to prepare.
To avoid heat-related illness, the health district recommends people plan activities in the morning or evening when it is cooler, dress in light-colored and loose-fitting clothing, avoid alcohol and high-sugar beverages, stay hydrated and avoid being out in the sun for extended periods.
Saquib added that following “simple, basic, commonsense measures” can help reduce the risk of sustaining burns. Some of those include wearing sunscreen and good-quality shoes with layers of padding to protect one’s feet from making direct contact with the pavement.
People with extra flip-flops can donate them to the Lions Burn Care Center for its summer flip-flop campaign, which provides the foot coverings to members of the homeless community to help protect their feet.
Those wanting to help Southern Nevada’s homeless population during the heat wave can also look for agencies that accept donations for sunscreen, flip-flops, lighter clothing, hats and sunglasses.
“(This heat) can be kind of life threatening for somebody who doesn’t have a place to go where they can get respite from those temperatures,” Carmine said. “(So) those are the kinds of things that agencies that are providing. ... Even donations of water are always needed.”
