Scorching heat blamed for at least 13 deaths in Texas and another in Louisiana is blanketing more of the Southeast. Government heat warnings Wednesday stretched into Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and storm-battered Arkansas. Lingering power outages after weekend storms compounded the misery in Arkansas. California, meanwhile, was facing its first major heat wave of the year. The National Weather Service warned that the dry, hot, windy conditions were ripe for dangerous fires in parts of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah. In Webb County, Texas, where the heat is blamed on 11 deaths, the county medical examiner says the heat is unprecedented.
