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Skeptoid

Skeptoid #424: The Santa Barbara Simoom of 1859

Skeptoid

Brian Dunning

Skeptic, Social Sciences, Skepticism, Paranormal, Conspiracy Theories, Urban Legends, Science, History

4.63K Ratings

🗓️ 22 July 2014

⏱️ 13 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Stories of a lethally hot storm wind in Santa Barbara in 1859 persist to this day.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

As the Earth warms and we tend to set new temperature records with increasing regularity,

0:08.3

the lists of hottest days ever often include one anomalous-dick entry.

0:12.9

A day in 1859, when in Santa Barbara, California, a freakish hot wind ripped down from the canyons

0:20.6

and wrought destruction with temperatures as high as 133 degrees Fahrenheit.

0:27.0

Today we're going to look at the evidence for this apocryphal catastrophe and see how much scrutiny it can stand.

0:34.2

The Santa Barbara Samoom is up next on Skeptoid.

0:43.4

You're listening to Skeptoid. I'm Brian Dunning from Skeptoid.com.

0:48.3

The Santa Barbara Samoom of 1859.

0:53.8

Today we're going to go back more than a century and a half to a hot summer day on the central coast of California

1:00.1

to the town of Santa Barbara. June 17th, 1859 began as a summer day much like any other,

1:07.5

clear with plenty of warm sunshine, plus a cool breeze to make it just perfect.

1:13.0

But according to legend, something happened that wrought sudden death and destruction

1:18.2

from out of nowhere a wind with temperatures usually reserved for baking ovens blasted down from the hills,

1:24.8

killing animals and injuring people. It immediately set the country's highest recorded temperature.

1:31.2

They named it the Samoom after the hot Sahara wind of the same name.

1:36.9

But it turns out that data is hard to come by. Was the Santa Barbara Samoom a true freak of nature,

1:44.9

or perhaps merely a tall tale told to visitors?

1:50.0

Here's a snippet from the 1859 Samoom from the Insiders Guide to Santa Barbara.

1:56.5

Until 1934, Santa Barbara had a record high temperature on the United States Weather Bureau's books.

2:03.0

On June 17th, 1859, a Samoom scorching wind swept down from the northwest and the Mercury

2:10.9

soared to 133 degrees Fahrenheit, about 56 degrees Celsius.

2:16.9

Cattle dropped dead and birds fell from the sky. The record was topped when the Mercury hit

...

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