Cook County morgue workers have handled airline crashes and large apartment fires, but nothing, they say, compared to the weekend’s unprecedented heat-related death toll.
That grim tally reached 54 Saturday night and was expected to grow by Sunday’s first light.
Coroners in outlying counties reported two heat-related deaths Saturday, both in Aurora.
“We’re calling this a weather-related disaster,” said Mike Boehmer, assistant administrator for the Cook County medical examiner’s office. “It’s the busiest day we’ve ever had. We’re really in a bad situation here.”
From 10 a.m. Friday to 6 p.m. Saturday, the morgue received about 120 bodies. A normal figure for that period would be 17, Boehmer said.
As he spoke, Boehmer learned that 69 additional bodies were on their way.
“You can bet the ranch that some of them are going to be heat-related,” he said.
The number of bodies so exceeded morgue capacity that a refrigerated semitrailer truck had to be brought in to store the overflow temporarily. Hospitals reported trying for as long as 45 minutes to get through on the phone to report a death. At the morgue, extra staffers were called in, and many employees worked double shifts.
Another measure of the problem facing morgue workers: The weekend toll in Cook County was higher than the heat-related deaths (53) for the entire summer of 1988 during that summer’s record-setting heat.
Saturday’s mounting death toll came as the weather finally started to improve after three days of intense heat. But the break in the heat did not come soon enough for many.
Most of those who fell victim to the heat wave were elderly, such as 95-year-old Mae Danielson of the Northwest Side. She was found in her sweltering apartment shortly after one concerned neighbor had checked on her.
After suffering a mild stroke two years ago, the tiny, frail woman struggled to look after herself, neighbors said. Her possessions were meager, and when the searing temperatures hit, she had only a standing box fan with which to cool herself.
“Nobody can afford an air conditioner here,” said Danielson’s neighbor, Alba Rodriguez. “Everyone is too poor.”
Like Danielson, many of the elderly victims had other pre-existing medical complications. Boehmer said it was nearly impossible to determine whether the heat caused or just contributed significantly to their deaths.
Friday afternoon, the number of deaths classified as heat-related stood at four. Explaining the sudden spurt over the following 24 hours, doctors said such deaths typically occur after prolonged exposure to severe heat.
“Elderly people just don’t have as good a mechanism for cooling down and sweating as the rest of us,” said Lynnette Doan-Wiggins, associate director of the emergency room at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood. “When they get nauseated from the heat, they also tend not to drink as much water as they should.”
Medications also tend to inhibit the body’s ability to regulate its temperature, Doan-Wiggins said.
Morgue officials used body temperature at the time of death and conditions in the victims’ homes to help determine whether to classify the fatalities as heat-related.
There are two classes of heat-related deaths: heat stroke and heat stress. Heat stroke is brought on by soaring body temperatures. Heat stress normally is caused by being in a hot place without benefit of open windows or air conditioning.
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Symptoms for heat stroke and heat stress include cramps, nausea, vomiting and dehydration. Doctors advise drinking plenty of fluids and staying close to fans if air conditioning is not available.
Chicago Health Department spokesman Tim Hadac said too many people were not taking the heat seriously.
“They understand it’s hot. They know the humidity’s high and they’re uncomfortable, but nobody makes the mental leap that they’re in danger here,” Hadac said. “They go on about their regular routine, and it may prove fatal.”
The city continued offering heat-weary residents havens from Saturday’s swelter at their “cooling centers”-the Department of Human Services district offices-at 10 S. Kedzie Ave., which is open 24 hours.
The Chicago area sweltered through record temperatures of 106 at Midway Airport on Thursday and 100 at O’Hare International Airport on Friday. By Saturday, temperatures dropped slightly. The high was 97 degrees, well below 1988’s record high of 102.
The worst, weather forecasters said, is over. Sunday’s high was predicted to be in the lower 90s, and thunderstorms were expected.
Among the youngest victims of the heat wave were two 3-year-olds who died Friday after their day-care provider apparently forgot them in the back of her car for an hour after returning from a movie theater. Police continued to investigate that case Saturday.
Autopsies were performed Saturday on the two victims-Kenneth Brown Jr. and Gino Rouse-and the medical examiner’s office was awaiting test results to determine causes of death.
Police said Margaret Ortiz, 43, had driven 10 children in her car back to her home on the Far South Side.
Most of the children were taken into her air-conditioned basement to cool off. An hour later, when her staff made a head count, Ortiz realized the two boys, who had fallen asleep during the ride, were in the car, police said.
The father of one of the boys said he does not blame Ortiz for the tragedy.
“I’m more sad than anything,” said Kenneth Brown Sr., whose son had been in Ortiz’s home-based day-care center for six months. “She didn’t do it on purpose.”
On Saturday, Mitzi Gaikis, nursing supervisor at Resurrection Medical Center on the Northwest Side, said the emergency room was swamped with heat cases all day.
“A lot of them are coming in unresponsive and critical,” she said. “We’ve seen (body) temperatures as high as 107. There have been six so far on the day shift, and they aren’t all older people. Some of them are young.”
The heat also caused widespread power outages in the city and suburbs. Nearly 41,000 North Side residents sweated out Friday night and much of Saturday after a circuit breaker caught fire at a Commonwealth Edison substation at California Avenue and Addison Street.
The power outage, which started about 6 p.m. Friday and lasted, for some, to the end of the day Saturday, temporarily closed area food stores and caused one young couple on Waveland Avenue to sleep in their car with the air conditioning running.
Some North Side residents complained Saturday night that Wrigley Field had enough electricity for a night Cubs game, while their homes remained without power.
But the heat was more than a sweaty inconvenience in many neighborhoods.
In Danielson’s two-story apartment building at 3255 N. Pulaski Rd., neighbors were concerned for her health. Alba Rodriguez repeatedly checked on Danielson in recent days to make sure she could stand the heat.
Rodriguez made one of those neighborly visits Friday night.
“I went to the store and I saw her standing in her doorway as if she were going to close the door,” said Rodriguez, 54. “I asked her if she was all right, and she said yes.”
Only 10 minutes later, Rodriguez said, she found Danielson sprawled across her bed clad in a cotton bathrobe, her eyes glassy and her pulse faint.