What is the hottest temperature that a human can survive without dying? I’ve heard people are in certain parts of California and it 122 degrees Ferenheit. Is it physically possible for a human body to withstand that type of heat?
In: Biology
What is that in Earth temperature?
Wet bulb temperature of ~95F(35C) is enough to kill humans. That comes from the humidity and it’s the result of the air being too filled with moisture for sweating to work to cool off our bodies (which evaporates and cools us off in the process, if the air is too saturated with moisture it wont evaporate and it won’t cool us off)
A lot of partial answers in here but people are missing the point. You can survive living in 115 with 0% humidity, people do that regularly in the southwest during the summer. But long exposure at just 95F with 70% humidity is enough to put you in serious danger.
There’s a calculator [here](https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/wet-bulb) that lets you know the wet bulb temperature given some baseline temperature and humidity level.
The Badwater Ultramarathon is a grueling 135-mile (217 km) race through Death Valley, known for its extreme heat, with temperatures reaching up to 127°F (53°C). The highest temperature ever recorded in Death Valley is 134.1°F (56.7°C), measured in 1913.
Just to let you know:
The *Turkish bath* (Hammam) is very humid (near 100% humidity), with relatively low temperatures, from 100°F to 120°C.
A *Finnish sauna* is a type of sauna that harnesses the power of dry heat. The temperature in sauna typically set around 180ºF-220ºF, while the humidity is typically kept around 5-20%.
Once I spent around 20 mins in Finish sauna with the temperature set at 223ºF (*not kidding!!!*). I was totally fine, just felt myself maybe a little exhausted 🙂
And there is a *Russian banya*: combination of the worst from above – quite *high humidity* (around 60-70%) with *high temperature* (140ºF-160ºF). Well, in this humid condition 160ºF feels much worse than 220ºF in Finish sauna.
> What is the hottest temperature that a human can survive without dying?
Arizona
Yeah, humans can handle high temps, but it depends. Around 120°F is pushing it dehydration’s a big risk. It’s all about how your body copes!
The proteins in your brain start to denature around 42°.
(Doesn’t mean we instantly die if the ambient temperature is 42°, just to be clear)
It’s not just heat. It’s heat + humidity. The human body can only remove heat effectively through sweating, and sweating is only possible when the wet bulb temperature is below 95 F. A wet bulb temperature is measured by taking a piece of cloth soaked in water and placing it on a thermometer. The water will evaporate so long as the ambient air is sufficiently dry, cooling the thermometer and thus reading a lower overall temperature than what would be measured without the wet cloth (think of it as all of the “hot” water molecules get up and fly away, leaving behind only the “cold” ones). The evaporation will continue until the thermometer is so cold that it would start to condense water back onto it, like a glass full of ice condenses humidity in the air. This is the wet bulb temperature.
When this wet bulb temperature is above 95 F, it means no amount of sweat generated by a person’s skin can evaporate and cool them. They will just keep getting hotter and hotter until their body reaches the wet bulb temperature, which will cause their organs to start failing and eventually death. Shade won’t help. Fans won’t help. Night time won’t help. The only escape is air conditioning, and for people in poverty who can’t afford it or don’t even have access to it, they’ll just die.
This condition has already been seen in India for longer and longer durations, and people invariably die. As the length of these events increases, until eventually it’s perpetual, people simply can’t live there.
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/wet-bulb-temperature-india-heatwave-2024-b2552395.html
Note that the critical wet bulb temperature is only 95 F… but people live in much hotter climates. How? Those climates are drier. Think the desert southwestern US. Super hot, but also super dry, so sweat will still evaporate. If humid places like Florida start to see 110 F, people will just die.
Depends on humidity. However it’s been shown you will die at as low of a temperature as 31 degrees Celsius at 100% humidity.
I used to do infrared asphalt repair. The ambient temperature around the machine was usually around 200 fahrenheit. We would do intense physical labor in those temps all day long. I had heat stroke numerous times but I lived.
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