Record Heat Dangerous in Cumming

The National Weather Service forecasts temperatures will reach 103 degrees in Cumming through the entire weekend, with little cooling off Monday and Tuesday as highs those days will be in the mid to high 90s.

Our welcome low temperatures in the low 70s keep Alpharetta and Milton from meeting heat advisory conditions, so take advantage of the cooler early morning temperatures if you plan to exercise outdoors. At 6:30 a.m. Friday, it was already 75 degrees, so don't wait too long. It will reach 90 degrees by 11 a.m. Take that extra long walk with your dog in the morning, too. It won't drop below 90 degrees until after 9 p.m., so don't expect too much relief before you go to bed.

Heat indexes will increase to 105 to 110 for Saturday and Sunday.

These conditions help create another danger, and that's unhealthy air quality, with an index of 151. The Metro Atlanta area is under a Code Red Air Quality Alert. In this range many people will be affected by ozone. Most people should restrict their outdoor exertion to morning or late evening hours when ozone concentrations are low to avoid high ozone exposures.

If the temperatures and lousy air quality weren't bad enough, coupled with relative humidity of 25 percent or less for four hours or more this afternoon and early evening create high fire danger conditions. Don't burn, don't smoke, don't shoot and, though it's tempting, don't shoot off fireworks during these conditions. My oldest brother lives in Colorado Springs, and while his home is safe from the forest fires for now, 32,000 other nearby residents had to flee their homes from a wall of fire.

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