The top ten hottest places on Earth all were in Australia yesterday — and not in the normally blazing outback but around the coastal city of Sydney.
Hottest of all was the suburb of Penrith, which on Saturday, Jan. 4 reached 48.9 degrees C. That's a Death-Valley-like 120 F.
The heat and accompanying high winds spurred bushfires to new heights of ferocity. The fires, in turn, generated their own thunderstorms, which whipped up the flames even more — and ignited new blazes with fire tornadoes and dry lightning.