Asphalt Burns and Heatstroke: Homeless in America’s Hottest City

The sun was barely up when the three-person medical team pulled into the parking lot of a Phoenix soup kitchen, but the temperature was already around 90 degrees, on its way to 111.

The team starts its rounds at 5 a.m. because the afternoon highs are so dangerous. Perla Puebla, the family nurse practitioner leading the team, took a look at Hawaii Kalawaia and Zephyr Harrell and could tell they were dehydrated from their dry lips and skin. It’s hard for homeless people not to be during Phoenix’s unrelenting summers.

Mr. Kalawaia, 61, said he had passed out a couple weeks earlier. And Ms. Puebla remembered all too well what had happened last year, when Mr. Harrell, 55, got so dehydrated that his kidneys started failing. She offered intravenous fluids, one of many free services provided by Circle the City, the nonprofit that runs the street-medicine teams.

Phoenix, the hottest city in the United States in the summer, is one of the most extreme examples of a threat that is growing across the country: unrelenting heat.