Weatherman Who Blogs for BB Patch: 'Death Valley Record Likely Broken'

Think it felt hot Sunday in the San Gorgonio Pass? A meteorologist with the National Weather Service says it was 109 in Beaumont and 116 in Whitewater.

But a weatherman who blogs for Banning-Beaumont Patch was in Death Valley yesterday and says he recorded a high temperature of 135.5 degrees at Badwater Basin.

That's right, more than 130 degrees Fahrenheit.

"It felt like an oven, your eyeballs were burning," Kevin Martin, founder of The Weather Space and Southern California Weather Authority, said Monday July 1 in a phone interview.

Any official temp reading over 134 would set a new record for the hottest temperature on Earth.

But the National Weather Service, which keep instruments at Furnace Creek, says the official high temperature for Death Valley on Sunday June 30 was 129.

A thermometer display outside the Furnace Creek Visitors Center showed unofficial readings up to 132 on Sunday, but those were not accurate, Death Valley public information officer Cheryl Chipman and National Weather Service meteorologist Chris Stachelski said in phone interviews.

"It's a general estimate, not calibrated to true temperatures, and it's something we're working on," Chipman said. "It's a relatively new display and we are still fine-tuning it."

Stachelski, who is based in Las Vegas and has visited Death Valley several times, said the thermometer display outside the visitors center was "strictly put there as a photo op. It's like a bank thermometer. It has a couple degrees warm bias."

Regardless, Martin believes his 135.5 temperature reading at Badwater Basin was accurate, and it shows the Weather Service needs a weather station at Badwater.

Martin, who is based in Corona, drove Sunday more than 250 miles to Furnace Creek and Badwater Basin with mother, Carolyn Martin, 63, of Hesperia. They took her Honda because it has working air conditioning and good tires, Martin said.

The 135.5 reading that appears in the photo with this report was recorded at 2:30 p.m. Sunday June 30 at Badwater, Martin said. He described holding the recorder inside the Honda, with the sensor outside near the edge of the basin, about 100 feet away, situated 6 to 7 feet off the ground, and shaded by a piece of cardboard 2 feet by 2 feet.

"I rigged it to make sure the sensor was not in direct sunlight, or heated by the material I used to shade it," Martin said. "Plastic or metal would make it hotter."

Martin said he used the same shaded rig at Furnace Creek to compare readings with the temperature display outside the visitors center.

"I was getting the same reading as the display," Martin said. "We got 129 at the same time."

Martin says he's convinced Badwater Basin is hotter than Furnace Creek because of the elevation, winds and heat coming off the white salt flat.

"There were people walking out a quarter-mile out on the basin and they were just insane," Martin said. "I walked about 300 feet out there, but I couldn't  take it more than five minutes. I started feeling very faint.  It felt like I was cooking from the inside out."

Stachelski agrees that Badwater Basin is warmer than Furnace Creek.

"Unofficially people have gone down there with thermometers, including myself," Stachelski said. "Badwater is generally 1 to 3 degrees warmer."

There is no official weather station at Badwater, so anyone curious about heat in what is home to the official world heat record has to settle for Furnace Creek.

There's interest among some weather observers to install a weather station at Badwater, Stachelski said. There are obstacles, though.

"There's no shelter, no ranger station, and it's a 35-mile one-way drive to read an instrument there," Stachelski said. "On a daily basis, people safety is more important in Death Valley. It's federally protected land, there's no utilities.

"Until they can get legal permissions and funding for a solar-powered, stand-alone weather station," Stachelski said, "it will stay on the wish list."

Martin has his Sunday experience posted on The Weather Space and headlined "Death Valley High Temperature Record Likely Broken, But Will Go Unnoticed."

Whatever comes of the world record debate, and whether or not a weather station is ever installed at Badwater Basin, Martin said he was glad to get away from Death Valley.

"When we got back last night it was 100 in Hesperia," he told Patch, "and it felt like heaven."

For now, the 134-degree reading recorded at Greenland Ranch in Death Valley on July 10, 1913, remains the official world record. Park and weather officials are planning a World Record Heat 100th Anniversary event on Wednesday July 10, 2013.

DEATH VALLEY FACTS:

- Badwater Basin in Death Valley National Park, is the lowest place in North America and one of the lowest places in the world at 282 feet below sea level.

- The highest point in the park is Telescope Peak, 11,049 feet above sea level.

- The park's area is approximately 3.3 million acres, or more than 5,000 square miles. The park is the largest in 49 states, excluding Alaska.

- The park is open 365 days a year.

- Death Valley was given its name by a group of goldseekers who got lost there in the winter of 1849-1850, according to the Park Service. They became known as the "Lost 49ers."

From the NPS Death Valley FAQ page:

Even though, as far as we know, only one of the group died here, they all assumed that this valley would be their grave. As the party climbed out of the valley over the Panamint Mountains, one of the men turned, looked back, and said "goodbye, Death Valley."

To read a Banning-Beaumont Patch advance report on Martin's trip, click the following link:

Weatherman who Blogs for BB Patch Seeks New World Record High in Death Valley

To read more about Badwater Basin, click here:

Hellacious habitat: There's hot, there's hotter, and then there's Death Valley