Why summer feels even hotter than usual

As much of the world swelters in record temperatures, spare a thought for Issam Genedi, who ekes out a living washing cars in one of the planet’s hottest regions, the Gulf.
Pausing from his work at an outdoor carpark in Dubai, the Egyptian migrant says the United Arab Emirates’ summer feels even hotter this year.
“This summer is a little more difficult than other years,” says Genedi, who shines cars for about 25 dirhams ($6.80) a time in temperatures that pass 40C each day.
“Between noon and 3pm or 3:30pm, we simply cannot work.”
The UAE - host of this year’s COP28 United Nations climate talks, where the world will try to sharpen its response to global warming - is no stranger to unbearable summers. In the blistering summer months, those who can decamp to cooler climes, or stay cocooned inside air-conditioned homes, offices and shopping malls.
The streets are largely deserted, apart from labourers hired from abroad. Many manual workers have a compulsory rest period in the hottest hours of the day.
It’s a similar story all around the energy-rich desert region. In Bahrain, July average temperatures threaten to beat the record of 42.1C set in 2017.
And in Kuwait, which regularly records some of the world’s highest temperatures, experts warn the mercury could pass a formidable 50C (122F) in the coming weeks.
Genedi is right that this summer seems unusually hot. Apart from last week being identified as the hottest ever recorded worldwide, a wave of humidity has been suffocating the Gulf.
“People have been left wondering if the temperatures are even higher” than usual, said Ahmed Habib of the UAE’s National Centre of Meteorology.
“An increase in relative humidity... combined with already high temperatures, makes the temperature seem higher than it really is,” he said, adding that ‘real-feel’ temperatures have ranged between 55-60C (131-140F) in some areas.
The extreme heat and high humidity are a dangerous mix. The combination is measured by a thermometer wrapped in a wet cloth to calculate the “wet bulb temperature” — the lowest possible through evaporative cooling.
In Kuwait, meteorologist Issa Ramadan said “the increase in temperature over the past year has been significant”.
“It is expected that from the middle of the month until August 20 there will be a noticeable rise in temperatures that may reach and even exceed 50C (122F) in the shade,” he said.
Humidity could top 90% in Bahrain by the end of the week, with maximum temperatures ranging between 42-44C (108-111F), according to official forecasts. In the UAE’s capital Abu Dhabi, the number of 40C-plus (104F-plus) days will rise by 98% by 2100 if global temperatures increase by 3C, according to the findings published in June by Vital Signs, a coalition of rights groups.
The same 3C global increase will see many countries experiencing 180 days of 40C-plus temperatures a year by the end of the century, it said.
Intense heat and humidity is already a daily reality for many in the Gulf, not least the thousands of mostly South Asian delivery motorcyclists who criss-cross its cities carrying food and other packages. “Our profession is a difficult one,” one of them, Mohamed Rajab, from Egypt, said in a Dubai street that was vacant apart from other riders.
“We always try to avoid the direct glare of the sun.”