Mike Kramlinger said his T-shirt would probably be wet by the end of the day. Even at 8 a.m. Saturday, sweat had begun to soak through it.
Kramlinger, 52, of Little Canada, owns Mike’s Kettle Corn and sets up shop at outdoor markets and festivals around Minneapolis. On Saturday he was selling kettle corn and standing over a hot burner popping corn — one of nearly 100 vendors working at the Minneapolis Farmers Market, which drew hundreds of shoppers despite forecasted temperatures reaching into the 90s this weekend.
“We’re out here no matter what the weather is,” he said.
It was a record-breaking day, and it felt like it. According to the National Weather Service, the Twin Cities reached 96 degrees as of 4:30 p.m., shattering the previous record for the date of 95 set in 1910. And the humidity made it feel like 105.
Just in time for summer’s first weekend, an extreme heat warning for the Twin Cities and most of Minnesota began at noon Saturday and was expected to continue through 9 p.m. Sunday.
Minneapolis officials urged people to protect family members and pets from extreme heat. According to city officials, seniors, small children, people with underlying medical conditions and pets are at greatest risk.
“We want everyone to take this heat seriously,” Rachel Sayre, director of the city’s Emergency Management Department, said in a news release. “The heat can be just as dangerous as severe storms or snow emergencies.”
Xe Thao, 39, another vendor at the farmers market, woke up at 3 a.m. in Northfield to load her truck with flowers and get to her spot by 5 a.m. Even at that early hour, she said, “It was really sticky.”