HOTTEST SPOT ON EARTH

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 May 1934, Page 5

HOTTEST SPOT ON EARTH

DEATH VALLEY. CALIFORNIA

The hottest spot in the world is Death Valley, an arid, sunken plain in California, about 12 miles in width and 150 miles in huiglh. Its maximum temporal ure of too degrees Fahrenheit .has never been equalled elsewhere. Piven at midnight lhe mercury hovers round 120 degrees, and so hot does the earth become in summer that a rock or a piece of iron scorches the naked hand. It is from the district that the world obtains its supply of borax, which used to be hauled by specially-built motor lorries to the nearest railway station, 165 miles distant. Driving

the lorries in the more torrid season proved fearfully trying. Drivers have been found dead, yet. holding a canteen of water in their band. In a few hours the water carried in the lank became so heated by the suns rays tbal frequently it was pumped into lhe boiler almost al Hie steamproducing stage. Engineers t)uv«* now linked Hie iimsl. imporlam mines with Hie outside world by railway. This

has rneatil Hie erection of miles of trestle embankments made from stout timber. What the men dreaded was not the loneliness of their surroundings, but the pitiless sun. Some idea nt' the intense neat experienced may be imagined when it is stated that a writing desk provided for the engineer curled, split, and fell to pieces in a. few days.