Mobile weather labs map toll of extreme heat in scorching US cities

For the past month, two trucks outfitted with weather sensors, lasers and balloons have roamed Arizona’s scorching cities measuring the heat in extraordinary detail. Such a ground-level view of urban “microclimates” could help cities keep people cool more effectively as climate change boosts temperatures.

“Arizona has been the most extreme environment where we’ve deployed so far because of the intensity of the heat,” says Katia Lamer at Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York, who is leading the survey. On…