Extreme heat in the USA: concrete is swelling on the roads, mussels are baked in sinks

It's incredibly hot in America. Extreme temperatures along Northern California's shores are causing mussels to bake to death in their shells and causing concrete highways to swell and burst in South Dakota.

Photo: twitter.com/SDHighwayPatrol

Jackie Sons, research coordinator at Bodega Marine Reserve, who has been working there for 15 years, has never seen anything like it before, she said CNN.

“As I approached the field site, I immediately saw that hundreds of mussels were dead,” Sons said Monday, July 1.

After conducting additional research, she found out that it was not about hundreds, but about tens of thousands of dead mussels baked in their shells. Previously, Sons had only seen individual fragments of mussels die out due to the intense heat, but she did not encounter such an extensive loss of mollusks.

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Sones had already encountered such cases when small pieces of mussels were dying out because of the heat, but she had never witnessed something so extensive. When mussels are alive and well, the shells of their shells remain pressed together. When the mussel dies, these shells open, exposing the inner tissue or empty shell.

In June, California had record heat, the temperature in the north of the state reached three digits.

Фото: Depositphotos

On June 10 and 11, the peak temperature in Santa Rosa—20 miles (32 kilometers) from Bodega Bay—was 100 degrees (37,8 Celsius). That day, the state issued a Flex Alert encouraging citizens to voluntarily conserve energy.

According to the corporation of independent electrical system operators, such warnings are issued only when there are interruptions in the electrical network or when the temperature is constantly high.

According to Sons, mussels are on the verge of death when the temperature reaches 90 degrees (32 Celsius). She believes that the dead on the banks of the mussels experienced temperatures around 100 degrees (37,8 Celsius).

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Concrete roads burst in South Dakota

In the state, concrete roads sag, swell and burst due to too high temperatures over the weekend. In Vermillion, South Dakota, the temperature maximum reached 94 degrees (34,4 Celsius). Considering the humidity, this heat was felt at about the level of 107 degrees (41,7 Celsius).

Photo: twitter.com/SDHighwayPatrol

A state road patrol warned drivers of two instances of concrete cracking along Highway No. 29.

Excessive heat causes concrete to expand. If the temperature is very high, the concrete expands too much, creating a deformation. According to CNN's meteorologist Brandon Miller, this deformation usually occurs in weak areas of concrete, when extensions push the concrete toward the joints and slabs where it is laid. This forms a deflection, crease or deep crack.

Photo: twitter.com/SDHighwayPatrol

As a result of the deformations, the roads were closed for five hours while the local service staff repaired the defect.

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