Weather service records hottest temperature on record in LA County

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Los Angeles County saw its highest temperature on official record Sunday after a high of 121 degrees Fahrenheit was recorded in the San Fernando Valley earlier in the day.

The federal agency said the temperature was recorded around noon in Woodland Hills at Pierce College, which runs one of the country’s oldest cooperative weather stations.

The 121° high temperature at Woodland Hills official site (Pierce College) was also the highest official temperature ever recorded in L.A. County as well as Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties. Click the URL for more details #cawx #LAheat https://t.co/wDCq45s0No pic.twitter.com/TAZuWF2vtG

— NWS Los Angeles (@NWSLosAngeles) September 6, 2020

The temperature, the agency said, was two degrees higher than the previous all-time high recorded at the site more than a decade ago.

While the agency noted online that there are “unofficial backyard weather stations” that have recorded past highs at 122 degrees Fahrenheit around Woodland Hills, it said the temperature recorded on Sunday is the highest taken down at an official recording station in the county.

“This is also the highest temperature ever observed at an official recording station in Los Angeles County, or in the Los Angeles County warning area which includes San Luis Obispo County, Santa Barbara County, Ventura County and Los Angeles County,” the service said in a report later on Sunday.

“The temperature at Woodland Hills may yet go up additionally, and many other records around the region will be broken today,” the agency also said in the report.

The report comes weeks after Death Valley was said to have recorded its highest temperature in over a century after the NWS Prediction Center said Furnace Creek hit 130 degrees Fahrenheit. The high came as the region was experiencing a heat wave at the time.