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(NEW YORK) — This year’s summer solstice arrives as a dangerous heat wave affects millions across the country, with early-season extreme heat impacting parts of the Midwest and Northeast.

But the longest day of the year — which begins Thursday at 4:51 p.m. ET — is not typically associated with the hottest temperatures of the season in the U.S. The most scorching conditions typically occur much later in the summer, records show, with different regions of the country experiencing their warmest average temperatures at varying times. Brutal summer heat, however, will increase in frequency and duration for much of the country over the coming weeks and months.

The summer solstice marks the beginning of astronomical summer in the Northern Hemisphere, according to NASA. Astronomical seasons are determined by the Earth’s tilt on its rotational axis and its orbit around the sun and do not take into account temperature data, which is what determines meteorological seasons.

Solstices occur when the planet’s tilt is most pronounced. The summer solstice occurs when Earth’s tilt toward the sun is at a maximum, bringing the longest day of the year.

On the first day of astronomical summer, the sun is at its highest point in the sky and so delivers the most direct solar radiation to the hemisphere experiencing the summer season. However, it takes time for that solar radiation to begin warming the Earth’s atmosphere and surface, especially the oceans.

This time difference creates a lag between the first day of summer and when the Earth experiences the hottest temperatures of the year.

For the contiguous U.S., records show July is the hottest month of the year, on average, with the majority of the country — including much of the Northeast, Midwest, and West — experiencing the hottest temperatures of the year during the second half of July and first half of August. However, some regions of the country don’t typically experience their warmest average temperatures until August, or even September.

Much of the South typically experiences its peak average temperatures during the second half of August, while for some regions of the West Coast, the warmest temperatures of the year usually don’t occur until September.

For this summer, overall above-average temperatures are forecast across much of the country, with several significant heat waves likely for parts of the Northeast and Southwest.

Earth has experienced 12 months of record high temperatures, according to reports published earlier this month by the World Meteorological Organization and Copernicus, Europe’s climate change service.

The record-breaking trend is expected to continue through June and could potentially last through the rest of the summer, forecasts show.

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(OAKLAND, Calif.) — At least four people were injured on Wednesday night as gunfire erupted at an event on Lake Merritt, in Oakland, California, police said.

More than 5,000 people had flocked to the area for the day’s event, which was being monitored by 28 police officers and four sergeants, the Oakland Police Department said in a statement early Thursday.

The event had been peaceful until about 8:15 p.m., when “illegal sideshow involving vehicles and motorbikes occurred near Grand Avenue and Bellevue Avenue,” the police said.

“A short time later, a fight broke out, and as the crowd headed towards the altercation, multiple shots were fired,” police said in their statement.” Officers located several victims who were struck by the gunfire.”

Police said early Thursday that there were no known fatalities. Officers were investigating whether there had been additional injuries, police said.

“No arrests have been made in connection with the shooting,” police said. “It is currently unknown if there was a single shooter or multiple shooters involved.”

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(BATON ROUGE, La.) — Louisiana public schools and colleges will be required to post an image of the Ten Commandments next year after a controversial bill was signed into law Wednesday.

Under H.B. 71 public classrooms starting from kindergarten to the collegiate level must have a poster of the Commandments up at the start of 2025.

Civil rights groups have already questioned the law that passed in Louisiana’s Republican-controlled state legislature on May 28, contending it violates the separation of church and state in public buildings. The American Civil Liberties Union has threatened to sue.

The bill was signed by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry, along with a package of others he said were designed to “expand faith in public schools.”

“If you want to respect the rule of law, you’ve got to start from the original law-giver, which was Moses,” Landry said at a news conference where he signed the bill.

The bill’s authors contend that the measure is not solely religious, but that it has historical significance. No other state currently has such a mandate for display of the Ten Commandments

The Ten Commandments are described in the law’s text as “foundational documents of our state and national government.”

“History records that James Madison, the fourth President of the United States of America, stated that “(w)e have staked the whole future of our new nation … upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments,” the text of the law read.

The displays, which will be paid for by private donations and not state dollars, will be “displayed on a poster or framed document,” the law says. The legislation’s text also calls for it to be printed in large, easily readable font.

The displays will also be paired with a four-paragraph “context statement” describing how the Ten Commandments “were a prominent part of American public education for almost three centuries.”

The Louisiana ACLU, however, contended that the law’s language is blatantly unconstitutional and said in a statement it plans to sue the state.

The ACLU cited the 1980, U.S. Supreme Court decision Stone v. Graham, which ruled that a similar law passed in Kentucky for its public school system violated the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution.

“The displays mandated by H.B. 71 will result in unconstitutional religious coercion of students, who are legally required to attend school and are thus a captive audience for school-sponsored religious messages,” the Louisiana ACLU said in a statement.

“They will also send a chilling message to students and families who do not follow the state’s preferred version of the Ten Commandments that they do not belong, and are not welcome, in our public schools,” the ACLU of Louisiana added.

Landry’s education package also includes laws that would authorize the hiring of chaplains in schools, restrict teachers from mentioning sexual orientation or gender identity, and prevent schools from using a transgender student’s preferred name or pronouns unless granted permission by parents.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice should impose a more than $24 billion fine on Boeing, according to the families of the 346 victims of two 737 Max 8 crashes in Ethiopia and Indonesia.

The families’ attorney, Paul Cassell, stated in a letter Wednesday to the Fraud Section of the Justice Department that a “maximum possible fine” is “legally justified and clearly appropriate” for what has been called “the deadliest corporate crime in U.S. history.”

The letter from the families came in response to a request from the Justice Department for their views on how the department should proceed, now that the government has deemed Boeing to be in breach of a 2021 deferred prosecution agreement that followed the crashes.

Some 189 people died when a Boeing 737 Max 8 plunged into the Java Sea off Indonesia on Oct. 29, 2018. Black box data from the Lion Air jet revealed the pilots struggled to fight the plane’s malfunctioning safety system from takeoff to the moment it nose-dived into the water.

Just five months later, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 — another Boeing 737 Max 8 — crashed near Addis Ababa airport just six minutes after takeoff, killing all 157 people on board.

Many of the family members showed up on Capitol Hill Tuesday during Senate subcommittee testimony by outgoing Boeing CEO David Calhoun. They held signs and shouted at Calhoun, who attempted to apologize for the failures of Boeing’s safety culture that led to the crashes.

He turned to the families in the hearing room, saying, “I apologize for the grief we have caused. We are focused on safety.”

In the final days of the Trump administration, the DOJ charged Boeing in a criminal information with one count of conspiracy to defraud the U.S. for allegedly misleading the Federal Aviation Administration during the agency’s evaluation of the new Max 8 aircraft.

The DOJ agreed to defer criminal prosecution for three years, but informed the company last month that it had allegedly failed to live up to its obligations under the deferred prosecution agreement. The Justice Department has indicated it is deliberating over whether to proceed with a prosecution of the company, and has said a decision will come on or before July 7.

ABC News has reached out to Boeing for comment.

Boeing has previously disputed the DOJ’s finding of a breach.

“We believe that we have honored the terms of that agreement, and look forward to the opportunity to respond to the Department on this issue,” the company said in a statement in May.

The families argue in the letter to the Justice Department that the “appropriate action now is an aggressive criminal prosecution of The Boeing Company” in a jury trial. If the government enters plea negotiations with Boeing, the families contend the company should be offered no concessions.

“A single conspiracy charge for fraud in a case revolving around 346 deaths is already extremely lenient treatment for such an extraordinarily serious crime. Against that backdrop, any further leniency through plea concessions would be utterly inappropriate,” the letter reads.

The families also advocate for criminal prosecutions of the responsible corporate officials at Boeing at the time of the two crashes.

The families further recommend:

• a portion of the fine should be devoted to appropriate safety and related measures;
• the court appoint an independent corporate monitor;
• the company remain on probation for five years;
• Boeing’s Board of Directors should meet with families;
• the DOJ continues investigation of other possible crimes

“The salient fact in this case is not complicated: Boeing lied, people died,” Cassell wrote. “That staggering loss should be reflected in the sentence in this case — including in the fine. Indeed, it would be morally reprehensible if the criminal justice system was incapable of capturing the enormous human costs of Boeing’s crime.”

The letter notes the families will “vehemently and appropriately object to any resolution that does not acknowledge Boeing’s responsibility for criminally killing their loved ones.”

The families’ letter also indicates they reached the $24 billion figure by calculating the total pecuniary value of the 346 lives lost and the total economic loss to Boeing’s customers, and then doubling it, in accordance with an alternative fines provision of the U.S. criminal code.

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(NEW YORK) — An “armed and dangerous” suspect connected to three murders and a slew of other crimes across the country is on the loose in Arkansas, according to authorities.

Stacy Lee Drake, 50, is wanted in connection with three homicides in Oklahoma, stemming from two separate carjackings, according to Arkansas State Police.

“Drake is separately wanted on multiple felony warrants from multiple jurisdictions, with charges including aggravated robbery, carjacking, and murder,” investigators said in a statement.

The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation gave more details Wednesday about two of the homicides that took place in Sequoyah County. Officers discovered a man and woman dead inside a business Tuesday.

The victims’ identities were not immediately released.

Although the victims’ causes of death are still being determined by the medical examiner, Oklahoma investigators said, “both sustained injuries consistent with homicide.”

Drake was last seen on foot outside a motel in Morrilton, Arkansas, roughly 53 miles northwest of Little Rock, according to police. Oklahoma investigators said a car he had allegedly stolen was found in Morrilton, which is roughly 130 miles east of where the bodies were found in Sequoyah County, Oklahoma, on Tuesday night.

Drake, a Birmingham, Alabama, resident, was described as having brown hair and brown eyes, standing about 5 feet, 11 inches tall and and weighing 185 pounds, according to state police.

“Anyone who sees Drake should not approach him and should call 911 immediately,” Arkansas State Police said in a statement.

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A tropical system off the coast of Mexico strengthened into Tropical Storm Alberto on Wednesday morning and is set to bring heavy rain and coastal flooding to Texas.

Alberto — the first named storm of the season — is forecast to make landfall in Mexico Wednesday night.

Alberto has prompted a tropical storm warning in Corpus Christi and south Texas. Flash flooding is possible from Corpus Christi to Laredo to Brownsville.

Rain totals could reach 10 inches in Texas and up to 20 inches in the mountains of Mexico over the next 24 hours.

Storm surge has already topped 4 feet at San Luis Pass, in Texas, just south of Galveston Island.

Atlantic hurricane season lasts from June 1 to Nov. 30.

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(NEW YORK) — More than 70 million people in 14 states from the Midwest into the Northeast were under heat alerts on Wednesday amid a sweltering early summer heat wave.

The extreme heat was expected on Wednesday to stretch farther north, touching parts of central and northern Maine.

The National Weather Service in Caribou, Maine, issued its first-ever excessive heat warning. Temperatures there are expected to reach 96 degrees, matching the record high.

Records are also possible on Wednesday in Concord, New Hampshire, at 97; Detroit, Michigan, at 94; Cleveland, Ohio, at 91; Buffalo, New York, at 91; and Hartford, Connecticut, at 95.

The record heat is expected to continue for the Northeast over the next few days, with hottest day for I-95 corridor to be on Thursday.

The dome of high pressure that is causing all the record heat is expected to begin to move back into the Ohio Valley by the end of the week and into the weekend.

The movement may bring record highs to major Midwestern cities, including Chicago, by Saturday.

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(NEW YORK) — Approximately 5,000 people have been evacuated in New Mexico on Tuesday as crews battle two wildfires that have spread across 20,000 acres, officials said.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a state of emergency as the dual South Fork Fire and Salt Fire have spread with 0% containment as of Tuesday afternoon.

Evacuation orders are in effect for three counties in the state: Mescalero, Otero and Lincoln, Grisham said during a Tuesday press conference.

Of the 5,000 people evacuated, 500 individuals are staying in 10 shelters and service centers, Grisham said.

While the exact number of homes and buildings damaged amid the blaze remains unknown as crews continue to battle the fires, Grisham estimated there have been 500 structures lost so far.

There are 17 federal and state agencies and 800 personnel on the ground working to help people amid evacuations, according to Grisham.

The governor said there are 13 wildfire hotshot crews battling the fires in addition to other fire teams.

The South Fork Fire was discovered at around 9 a.m. Monday morning on the Mescalero Reservation, west of the Village of Ruidoso, the New Mexico Forestry Division said, noting the cause of the fire remains unknown.

“Fire growth has been rapid with extreme fire behavior,” the division said.

Nearby, the Salt Fire, also in the Mescalero Reservation, is slower moving but “creeping through difficult, mountainous terrain south of Ruidoso,” fire officials said.

The Mescalero Reservation is approximately 130 miles southeast of Albuquerque

New Mexico has submitted a federal emergency disaster request, which Grisham noted should be approved within the next 24 hours.

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(SYRACUSE, N.Y.) — An explosion at a large family’s home in Syracuse, New York, left 10 people in severe or critical condition on Tuesday night.

Around 50 firefighters responded to the residence at 205 Carbon Street around 4 p.m. ET, where they smelled a strong odor of gas and found a car underneath the collapse, Syracuse Fire Chief Michael Monds told reporters on Tuesday.

Multiple victims were found spread out around the building, Monds said. First responders sent 13 people at the scene to the hospital, 10 by ambulance, he told the media.

Six victims were found outside of the structure, the chief said. Victims sustained burns and crush injuries.

A young child was found in the car near the structure, and three others were found in void spaces inside the structure.

Authorities had searched 95% of the home Tuesday night, the chief said.

Dogs trained to search for live victims searched the home twice, and a cadaver dog is being brought in to search the home, the chief said.

Authorities believe that everyone has been accounted for.

Syracuse Mayor Ben Walsh said at a press conference that a family of seven live at the home. Another family of six was visiting the home at the time of the incident, he said.

There are no open code violations for the home, according to the mayor. The landlord is currently being interviewed by authorities.

The cause of the explosion is still under investigation. Authorities will reconvene Wednesday morning to continue their investigation, Monds said.

National Grid responded to the scene to ensure there were no gas leaks and is working with firefighter investigators to determine the cause of the collapse. A spokesperson for the utility company told ABC News there were no reports of any gas leaks before the home collapse.

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(LOS ANGELES) — The nation’s second-largest school district has voted to ban cellphone and social media use for over 429,000 K-12 students during school days.

The Los Angeles Unified School District board passed the ban by a vote of 5 to 2 on Tuesday morning, one day after U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek H. Murthy called for an immediate warning label on social media platforms in a New York Times op-ed, similar to warnings on cigarette packs mandated by Congress in the 1960s.

Jessica Quindel, a math teacher at Venice High School in the district, spoke prior to the vote and called for the proposal to pass. Quindel described the daily management of students’ use of smart cellphones as an “uphill battle” and said teachers struggled to keep the “culture” of student cellphone use under control.

“Managing student use of smartphones as a classroom teacher is now more like running a nonstop marathon. It takes a lot of energy and it’s really hard to keep up,” Quindel said.

The school district will now have to develop and present updated cellphone and social media policies within 120 days, or by the fall semester, that would forbid students by the spring semester of the 2024-2025 school year from using cellphones and social media platforms during the school day. LAUSD cited possible tactics like locked pouches, cellphone lockers or technological means and promised the policies would be “informed by best practices and by input from experts in the field, labor partners, staff, students, and parents.”

The updated policy change would also take into consideration students who use cellphones for translation and evaluate social media use for youth.

Medical experts have joined the chorus of parents, teachers and administrators raising alarm bells in recent years about social media’s negative effects on children and adolescents.

“The mental health crisis among young people is an emergency — and social media has emerged as an important contributor,” Murthy wrote in his op-ed Monday, adding that teens face higher risks of anxiety and depression and had reported spending an average of nearly five hours a day on social media last summer.

Speaking with “GMA3” on Tuesday, Murthy said the proposed warning label cited in his op-ed, which would need to be approved by Congress, would be a digital label that would appear regularly when using social media.

“The exact design of it, the frequency with which it appears — that would all be determined in a scientific testing process that we would undergo after Congress authorized the label,” Murthy said. “That’s what we do with tobacco and alcohol labels, and the good news about labels is that we thankfully know from experience that these labels actually do work. In the case of tobacco labels, they are effective in increasing awareness and in changing behavior.”

LAUSD is not the first district to pass a cellphone ban for students. Others like the Manchester Public School District in Connecticut already require students to lock cellphones in secure pouches before they are allowed to get them back at the end of the school day.

In addition to school districts, lawmakers across the country have been considering how to address the mental health of youth. Legislators in New York, for instance, passed a bill earlier this month that would halt social media platforms from showing suggested posts to users under 18.

This article was updated to note the Los Angeles Unified School District voted to pass the cellphone and social media ban.

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