alt Hacker NewsThe amount of arrogance in this thread about what temperatures become fatal is baffling. Hyperthermia is not something that kills you on the timeline of minutes or even hours at wet bulb temperatures of 100F+, or even 105F+.
Remember, when people get sick it's not typically fatal for them to hold a body temperature of 104 degrees, even if sustained for more than 24 hours. Being in a work environment at 95+% relative humidity and 100F is going to be unpleasant, but as long as you are well adapted to it and you get to somewhere cooler within a few hours you are going to be fine.
People push well beyond a wet bulb of 105F in saunas all the time, often sustained for 30+ minutes. I think if you had yourself ever been in a room that's 110F and 100% humidity (meaning it's literally raining continuously from condensation) you'd realize that it's really not that extreme of a temperature, and that it takes hours for your core to heat up to a place where you will be at risk of dying.
I know of at least one instance where several well acclimatized individuals died in less than 15 minutes in open air in the Grand Canyon above the Colorado River due to solar heating and 95% wet bulb humidity.
I’d argue you just haven’t actually been in those types of situations either. In that case I think they estimated 110ish air temps.
But maybe I’m misremembering - I heard it from the investigating safety officer though.
I have yet to see anyone actually able to work or function in actual 100% humidity and 100+ degrees temps for more than a few minutes before having serious problems.
I’ve seen plenty of people have problems in 60% humidity which everyone agreed was terrible. Mostly heat stroke.
People’s core temp is already just a hair under 100F, and even at rest are producing 100ish watts of thermal energy. It really doesn’t take much for it to start spiking if cooling is literally impossible.