From The Las Vegas Review-Journal (Henry Brean):
The famously fiery national park 100 miles to the west set an unpleasant record in July with an average temperature of 107.4 degrees. That ranks as the hottest month ever measured in the Western Hemisphere, according to the National Weather Service.
Christopher Burt thinks it might be a world record as well.
The weather historian for Weather Underground said he only knows of one monthly average that’s higher — 107.44 degrees recorded in July 2014 at a military base in northern Saudi Arabia — but that measurement has been discredited because it apparently didn’t include overnight temperature readings.
“So far nobody’s come up with another figure that’s higher than Death Valley’s,” Burt said.
Andy Gorelow, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Las Vegas, said unusually hot conditions at night were largely responsible for the new monthly record in Death Valley.
The average low at the park’s official weather station in Furnace Creek, California, was 95.1 in July, the warmest of any month on record by more than a full degree.
By comparison, Gorelow said, “the highs really weren’t that high.”
That’s relatively speaking, of course.
The average high in Death Valley last month was 119.6 degrees. July 7 was the single hottest day, with a high of 127. The temperature never dropped below 89 all month.