Fair and 55° F

Squeals of joy from little voices filled the grounds of the popular Edisto Memorial Gardens Spray Park Thursday afternoon as kids scurried to and fro under tipping water buckets.

With afternoon temperatures soaring to the upper 90s under a relentless early June sun, the Spray Park and its refreshing waters proved an oasis for Deidre Mack and her two children, Marshea, 1, and Jordan, 4.

Smiling ear to ear and as wet as a fish, Jordan was wound up about the many things to see and get wet under.

“I like the buckets and I like that and that,” he said, pointing at the colorful water arches and spraying pistols while his little feet carried him further and further into the midst of the water world.

“It is so fun.”

And, for Mack, keeping her kids entertained close to home was her gain.

“With gas prices so high, you don’t have to drive to the beach,” Mack said. “This is safe and open so I can see them.”

Mack said Jordan had been anticipating coming to the spray park all week and she was able to get off early from work to make his wish a reality.

“It is a great way to cool off,” she said. “It is very cheap to come here, too.”

The Macks joined about 200 other children who came through the park Thursday.

View a photo slideshow from the Edisto Memorial Gardens Spray Park

“We had about 40 kids from one day-care today,” said Grayson Davis, who was overseeing the operations of the Spray Park.

Davis said the crowd was above average, especially for a weekday.

The heat did not seem to bother brothers Nick and Robert Stukes who decided to spend part of the afternoon playing a little tennis at the Edisto Gardens tennis courts.

With sweat glistening all over his body and the heat radiating off the clay tennis courts, Robert said boredom drove him to the courts.

“I am used to playing tennis when it is hot,” he said, noting that the two had been out for about 30 minutes. Taking time to serve before continuing, Stukes said, “We have water in the car so we don’t get dehydrated.”

The 22-year-old South Carolina State University senior said he was looking forward to ending the match and going home for a nice, cold shower.

While for some the heat was an opportunity to bring out the bathing suits, for others it was business as usual.

Adam Joye, Orangeburg Department of Parks and Recreation supervisor and assistant horticulturist, was taking a break in the DPR truck relishing the cool air blowing from the cab’s air conditioner.

Joye was winding down a long day of mowing grass, pulling weeds and trimming roses at Edisto Memorial Gardens and cutting limbs off of the honey locusts.

He said his crew of eight was braving the heat well thus far.

“I tell them to take it a little easier and not to work as hard, with more water breaks,” Joye said, adding that an effort is also made to do most of the heavy work in the early morning hours before the intense heat arrives. “It feels like August already. You try to take it as easy as you can. You try to move at an easy pace. I don’t want anybody to get heat exhaustion. Everybody seems to be acclimated pretty good so far.”

Orangeburg Parks and Recreation Director Buster Smith said crews Thursday were all over the city working in cemeteries, ball fields and Edisto Memorial Gardens.

“We make sure all our water coolers are on the trucks, and we keep them (workers) well irrigated,” Smith said. “Any time temperatures are excessive, we authorize additional breaks during the work day. We stress to them to keep plenty of liquids in their system.”

By 11:53 a.m., the temperature at Orangeburg Municipal Airport was 91 degrees with a heat index of 97 degrees.

At 3:53 p.m., the temperature at the airport was 95 degrees with a heat index of 97, according to the National Weather Service.

Forecasts for the remainder of the week called for much of the same, with a possible heat advisory for today.

The Columbia National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for The Times and Democrat Region in effect from noon until 8 p.m. Thursday, with afternoon temperatures forecast to approach 100 degrees and heat index values between 105 degrees and 107 degrees.

Highs through the weekend were forecast to top off at 96 degrees before falling to around 93 degrees next Wednesday. The normal high for this time of year in Orangeburg is 87 degrees.

There was no chance of rain forecast through next Wednesday.

A heat advisory means that a period of hot temperatures is expected. The combination of hot temperatures and high humidity levels can combine to create a situation in which heat illnesses are possible.

Individuals are encouraged to drink plenty of fluids, stay in air-conditioned places, stay out of the sunshine and check up on relatives and neighbors.

Orangeburg Department of Public Works Director Durwood Bowden said the city’s sanitation crews start early, around 7 a.m., and usually end the day at 2 p.m. The shortened day helps crews avoid the extreme heat, he said.

According to the National Weather Service in Columbia, climatological data from the middle of spring to late summer show the hottest time of day usually occurs between 3:30 p.m. and 5:30 p.m.

Bowden said dealing with the heat is all about common sense.

“We tell them to take all the breaks they need,” he said. “We provide Gatorade and ask they drink plenty of fluids.”

Most of the sanitation trucks have air conditioning, Bowden said, and the yard trash units are also air conditioned.

“We have things in fairly good shape where the guys can get cooled off,” he said.

The unusual early June heat is blamed on a strong high pressure system over the region. Heat advisories Thursday were issued throughout the eastern portion of the Carolinas up to southeastern Virginia.

“Somebody has turned up the oven,” Meteorologist Leonard Vaughan said. “It looks like the heat wave will last through the weekend and into next week. The high pressure ridge looks like it will try to move further off the Atlantic coast by next weekend.”

Vaughan said the high temperatures, while above normal for this time of year, are not without precedent.

“It will be close to a record heat wave, but we have had hotter periods in early June,” he said, noting that, historically, the state has seen temperatures crack the century mark by this time.

Vaughan said the early hot temperatures are no indication of what is to come. Climatological data through August show The T&D Region temperatures, along with rainfall, at normal levels, he said.

T&D Staff Writer Gene Zaleski can be reached by e-mail at gzaleski@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-533-5551.

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