The northeastern United States sweltered this week in a scorching summer heat wave, complete with stagnant, sticky air and no winds for relief, forecasters said. Even in a summer already filled with stretches of very hot weather, this week will be stubbornly brutal, with no relief in sight until the weekend brings thunderstorms to the region, they said. "Plain and simple, this week may feel the worst of any week for this summer in the Northeast," said Accuweather.com meteorologist Alex Sosnowski. (Reuters)

A vendor sells fish at Central Market in freezing conditions of minus 43 degrees Celsius in the city of Yakutsk, Sakha (Yakutia), Russia on December 13, 2020. The winters in Yakutsk are extremely cold and long and the summers short and warm, with temperatures sometimes rising above 30C. (Photo by Yevgeny Sofroneyev/TASS)

Women quench their thirst with the tap water on a hot summer afternoon during heatwave in Prayagraj on June 10, 2024. India's heatwave is the longest ever to hit the country, the government's top weather expert said on June 10 as he warned people will face increasingly oppressive temperatures. Parts of northern India have been gripped by a heatwave since mid-May, with temperatures soaring over 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit). (Photo by Anil Shakya/AFP Photo)

Miners work extremely long days under the hot sun and the hours are often longer in illegal mines in Ghana, West Africa, 2014. An Australian photographer has captured the harsh reality of illegal mining under the unforgiving sun with these Ghanaian miners. (Photo by Heidi Woodman/Barcroft Images)

A young woman wearing the summer Kimono, “Yukata” watches the goldfishes during the press preview of “Eco Edo Nihombashi Art Aquarium 2014” exhibition in Tokyo on July 10, 2014. The two-month-long goldfish exhibition will starts July 11. (Photo by Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP Photo)

Crown line handler Bobby Marie controls “Chain Gang” as the balloon is inflated during the 43nd Annual Helen to the Atlantic Balloon Race and Festival, in Helen, Georgia, USA, 04 June 2016. The race is the oldest balloon event in the southern USA and United States' only long-distance hot air balloon race, according to the organizers. (Photo by Erik S. Lesser/EPA)

Long Exposure pictures showing Mount Sinabung spewing out hot lava on August 2, 2017 in Karo, Indonesia. Sinabung located in North Sumatra Province roared back to life in 2010 for the first time in 400 years. After another period of inactivity it erupted once more in 2013, and has remained highly active since. (Photo by Albert Damanik/Barcroft Images)

Nobby the polar bear cools down as he plays in a lake at the Yorkshire Wildlife Park in Doncaster, England, Friday June 17, 2022. A blanket of hot air stretching from the Mediterranean to the North Sea is giving much of western Europe its first heat wave of the summer, with temperatures forecast to top 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) from Malaga to London on Friday. (Photo by Danny Lawson/PA Wire via AP Photo)