Warming May Mean Stifling Future for Middle East

Much of the Middle East already swelters through what are some of the hottest summers on the planet, but, occasionally, a combination of sky-high temperatures and incredible humidity can take conditions to almost unreal levels.

In late July this year, for example, a major heat wave combined with astronomically high humidity to send the heat index in Bandar Mahshahr, Iran — near the northern coast of the Persian Gulf — to a mind-bending 163°F.

Such intense levels of heat and humidity tax the abilities of even healthy human bodies to cope and can be deadly for the elderly and infirm, as other recent major heat waves, such as the ones that swept across Europe in 2003 or Russia in 2010, showed.

If the buildup of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere continues unabated, these worst-of-the-worst heat waves look to become more common and reach new, unfathomable heights in the Persian Gulf area, a new study detailed in the journal Nature Climate Change finds.

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