Death Valley’s brutal 130 degrees may be record if verified

DEATH VALLEY NATIONAL PARK, CA (AP) — Death Valley reported a temperature of 130 degrees amid a blistering heat wave.

If meteorologists can verify Sunday’s reading it would be the hottest temperature on Earth in more than 89 years.

It would be the third hottest on record, behind 134 degrees measured in the same place in 1913.

It also would be hottest August temperature recorded on Earth.

The World Meteorological Organization is investigating.

Scientists say the conditions were ripe for such a record. And it came in a week of wild weather bingo, including a fire tornado and a devastating derecho.