Record Heat Wave Scorches Dozen-Plus States, Shattering March Temperature Records

Temperatures reached record highs across more than a dozen states Wednesday as a punishing heat wave that had already scorched the West extended its reach into the nation's midsection. The event was already historic before Wednesday's readings even came in.

Phoenix was among the hardest hit, recording a high of 100 degrees on Wednesday, a daily record confirmed by the National Weather Service. The city also set a new record warm low of 68 degrees overnight, besting the previous mark of 66 degrees that had stood since 2025 and 2004. Phoenix had already endured multiple triple-digit days since the heat wave began, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Digital Forecast Database. Other cities breaking daily records Wednesday included Yuma, Arizona; Las Vegas, Nevada; Salt Lake City, Utah; Rawlins, Wyoming; and Pocatello, Idaho.

Salt Lake City broke its daily record with 83 degrees, surpassing the previous record of 78 degrees set in 2022. In Tucson, a seven-day streak of tying or breaking maximum daily record highs came to an end at 95 degrees, just one degree short of the date's record.

The heat wave's eastward push over the weekend produced a fresh round of milestones across the central United States. Topeka, Kansas, broke its March record with a high of 95 degrees, while Kansas City, Missouri, and North Platte, Nebraska, each reached 92 degrees, also new March records. Cheyenne, Wyoming, set an all-time March high at 83 degrees, and Denver recorded an all-time daily high of 86 degrees Saturday. Grand Island, Nebraska, and Midland, Texas, each hit 98 degrees, also all-time daily records for those cities.

Few data points captured the week's whiplash as starkly as the numbers out of Chanute, Kansas. Temperatures in Chanute went from a record low of 13 degrees on March 16 to a record high of 91 degrees just four days later, a swing of 78 degrees in under a week.

Along the southern California-Arizona border, Yuma, Arizona, hit 109 degrees on Friday afternoon, breaking the previous national March record of 108 degrees that had been set at Rio Grande City, Texas, in 1954. Four stations, two in Arizona and two in California, then recorded 112 degrees Fahrenheit on Friday, March 20, besting the all-time U.S. March record set just the day before. That figure smashed the record for the hottest March day in the continental United States by four degrees and was only one degree short of the hottest April reading ever recorded in the Lower 48.

Climatologist and weather historian Maximiliano Herrera compiled a list of 14 states that set their hottest March day on record during this heat dome: California, Arizona, Nevada, Kansas, New Mexico, Nebraska, Utah, South Dakota, Missouri, Iowa, Colorado, Wyoming, Minnesota, and Idaho. Fox Weather reported that over 1,500 records were broken across 13 states in the span of a single week, with at least 95 locations setting new daily records or tying their all-time warmest March day.

CBS News meteorologist Nikki Nolan projected that more than 200 additional daily temperature records could be broken through Sunday, with the heat wave forecast to slowly move eastward and eventually reach the East Coast by Friday. Central states were expected to see temperatures 30 to 40 degrees above average, and forecasters warned of a critical fire weather threat from the Rocky Mountains down to the Southern Plains, with fire weather alerts stretching from Montana to Texas. The National Weather Service also issued an extreme heat warning for desert areas and a red flag warning covering much of Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma.

The World Weather Attribution research group concluded this heat wave would be "virtually impossible without climate change," finding it has become about four times more likely just in the past decade due to heat trapped by greenhouse gases. The event posed a significant public health threat, particularly given its early-season timing, with the persistent heat dome suppressing cloud formation and allowing temperatures to climb without interruption.