Sisters Ashley Smith and Amanda Schaefer don’t agree on whether a late-summer heat wave like the one that began its descent on Toledo on Monday is a blessing or a curse, but they were on the same page as to what to do about it.
“We’re getting ice cream and going swimming. It’s perfect weather,” Ms. Smith, the hot-weather fan, said while she, her sister, and Ms. Schaefer’s two young sons, Wyatt and Walker, ate ice cream in the lot near the Lickity Split in South Toledo.
“I prefer, like, 65 [degrees] — all year round if I could,” Ms. Schaefer said. “I don’t like being hot. But it is perfect for swimming. It’s great for the kids if they have someplace to swim.”
For their group, that someplace was the sisters’ grandmother’s house. so it didn’t matter that Toledo’s city pools have already closed for the season.
At Eugene F. Kranz Toledo Express Airport, the temperature topped out at 92 degrees at 3:22 p.m., the second of what was forecast to be four straight 90-plus days.
Forecasters don’t expect Tuesday to be Toledo’s hottest day of the year — that status currently rests with June 17, when the airport temperature peaked at 99 degrees on the third of eight straight 90-or-higher days.
But if the high reaches or exceeds the 96-degree high predicted for the airport by the National Weather Service office in Cleveland on Monday afternoon, it will be the hottest day since then. The record for the date, set in 1993, is 99.
That might be a bit much even for Corey Jackson, a South Toledo resident who stopped for ice cream with his two daughters and professed not minding the unusual heat.
“You take it day by day, whatever God gives you,” Mr. Jackson said before allowing that on Tuesday, he will “try to stay inside.”
That would be consistent with advice forecasters gave for area residents to stay indoors, in air-conditioned rooms, if the heat is likely to bother them.
The weather service posted heat advisories effective for varying durations Tuesday for the western half of Ohio, nearly all of Indiana, and southern Michigan for high heat and humidity that combined could feel like 100 degrees or higher. In north central Indiana, southern Wisconsin, and nearly all of Illinois and Iowa, even sterner excessive heat warnings were posted.
The advisory for Lucas, Wood, and counties east of those was scheduled for noon through 8 p.m. Forecasters said heat-related illnesses are possible and advised people to wear loose-fitting clothing, drink plenty of fluids, and limit strenuous activity to morning or evening.
Relatives or neighbors who are vulnerable to heat should be checked on, the weather service said.
The city of Toledo urged “sensitive groups” to take “precautionary measures” against the heat while urging the public to avoid unnecessary driving, refuel vehicles after dark, conserve energy where possible, and avoid the use of petroleum-based solvents and paints. All of these steps will help reduce hydrocarbon pollution that increases the surface air’s concentration of ozone, which is a lung irritant particularly harmful to the very young, very old, and people with respiratory illnesses.
In far northwest Ohio, the heat advisory will start at 11 a.m. and expire at 10 p.m., while its effective time in southeast Michigan is 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Forecasters expected only slightly cooler weather Wednesday, with an expected high around 93 at the Toledo airport and a 30 percent chance of thunderstorms that could be severe. Thunderstorm possibilities and above-average heat were expected to continue through Friday, along with sultry weather at night until a cold front ushers cooler, dryer air into the region early in the weekend.
That will be good news for Kevin Plute, who lives near the Toledo Zoo and said he’s “not a huge fan of the heat.”
“I usually like September, when football season starts. I’m used to cooler weather,” Mr. Plute said.
“I’m not looking forward to it — very much so,” agreed Dan Meade of the Old West End, who bought both a soft-serve cone and a slushie.
“It used to be we just got two or three days” of high heat, but now “it gets hotter more often than it used to,” he said. “I’ll be excited when fall gets here, and I hope it’s more than just two weeks.”
After the very warm June, though, the airport’s thermometer only got up to 91 degrees in July, National Weather Service data for most of August at Toledo Express was missing Monday on that agency’s website, but the temperature reached 91 there on Sunday.
“We really haven’t had to turn on the air conditioning much all summer,” said Clay Shaw of South Toledo, who visited the Lickity Split with Breanna Culross.
While Mr. Shaw said he favors cooler weather, Ms. Culross was eager for the heat.
“I love the heat,” she said, “because I don’t like the snow.”
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