Living through sizzling temperatures in Banda, Indian town that is one of the world's hottest

BANDA, India (AP) — Heat at all hours, even in the middle of the night. Long stretches without electricity, meaning some homes can't even use basic fans. And a constant search for relief, like being hosed down with water or sleeping outside.

For many residents of Banda, a town in northern India that has recorded some of the country's highest temperatures, just getting through each day is a challenge.

Global warming, caused mostly by the burning of fuels like gas, oil and coal, is making heat waves across India more frequent and intense. Uttar Pradesh, the state Banda is in, is among those most vulnerable to extreme heat. In 2023, at least 119 people died over several days during a severe heat wave in parts of the state.

In May, temperatures reached 48.2 Celsius (118.8 Fahrenheit), one of multiple times this year that the town recorded the country’s highest temperature for the day. Banda was also the hottest spot on Earth seven times this year, most of them in April, according to climatologist and weather historian Maximiliano Herrera, who tracks global weather extremes. Since then, temperatures have dropped some but are still stifling, particularly as seasonal rains increase humidity.

In June, an Associated Press team went to Banda to report on how people try to cope with the heat throughout the day.

Munni Devi and her four sons begin work loading and unloading vegetables when most of the town is asleep.

It’s only 4 a.m., but the temperature is already 30 C (86 F). Workers at Banda's vegetable market are busy unloading tomatoes, jackfruits and other vegetables and transferring them to smaller vehicles for delivery to neighborhood shops.

Devi, 70, says the heat is becoming more intense every year, and this year has been especially bad. The work is physically demanding in any weather. During a heat wave, it can be brutal. But Devi says she and her sons can’t afford to miss a day.

“Everyone feels the heat, but because of our circumstances, we have to bear it,” she says.

At the market, young men wheel carts through narrow lanes. Women sort vegetables on the streets. Devi says many buyers arrive early, hoping to finish shopping before temperatures soar.

Devi and her sons work from early morning until lunch, then return home to recuperate.

She says unreliable power to her home means there is little respite even there. Devi’s grandchildren get sprayed down every day with a water hose to get some relief.

“If there is no power, even the ceiling fans don’t work. Sometimes there is no power for hours,” she says.

As the afternoon sun bakes Banda’s streets, residents who can afford to stay inside do so. But some vegetable sellers and auto rickshaw drivers stay outdoors in hopes of attracting a little more business.

Meanwhile, 70-year-old animal lover Shobharam Kashyap is busy making wooden birdhouses at a workshop in his home.

Kashyap says he and other volunteers have installed over 15,000 birdhouses across the town to give birds respite from an increasingly harsh environment.

Kashyap’s brightly painted birdhouses — many of which are painted green as he says birds seem to prefer that color — have been mounted on trees and walls across Banda.

He has also placed clay water bowls in and near his home to give birds a place for a dip or drink.

Kashyap says he is continuing traditional practices of caring for other animals.

“Our culture has long encouraged feeding birds. Women visiting temples traditionally offer rice. Neither the priest nor the deity consumes it — the birds do,” he says.

Hotter days have brought more patients to the hospital in Banda, one of the bigger medical centers in this region. Those with heat maladies, ranging from fainting to heatstroke, tend to come in the afternoon and evening, filling the corridors and wards.

Patients sit shoulder-to-shoulder on benches. Relatives fan family members with sheets of paper. Hospital staff move between beds carrying intravenous fluids.

Dr. Abhishek Pranayami, the hospital's head doctor, says the hospital sees a surge of patients every summer, "and the number of patients is increasing every year.”

He says they are treating large numbers of people suffering from dehydration, diarrhea, vomiting and abdominal pain — illnesses that become more common as temperatures rise. Some patients recover within days. Others take longer.

“Pressure is quite high on us and the staff,” he says.

Even after sunset, Banda remains hot.

When young boys play a game of cricket, they keep their water bottles cool by wrapping them in torn clothes.

At the town’s railway station, families sometimes gather late into the night, hoping the open platforms and occasional breeze will be more comfortable than cramped homes that have absorbed heat all day.

On one such night, dozens are sleeping in the station to avoid the heat. In one spot, several children and adults sleep on blankets spread out on the stone platform with parked train cars a few feet away. Some use bags as pillows. A pile of flip-flops sits inches from their bare feet. Another man stretches out on a bench, with his head on a backpack.

Nearby, several men and women are trying to sleep on blankets near the ticket kiosks, despite the bright lights. Dogs lie between some of the people on the ground, also trying to get relief.

Laborers whose homes are too small and hot to sleep in are sleeping on blankets outside the railway station's entrance, trying their best to get some rest in the hot night. Regardless of the noise of vehicles and passengers entering and leaving the station, laborers and residents are lying on towels and sometimes right on the gravel as the relatively open, breezy roads and pavements near the railway station give them the best chance for some shut-eye.

For parents with little children, the hot night is too uncomfortable for sleep, so they wait in the station, huddled around a smartphone.

The struggle for relief and rest has become a defining feature of summer in cities like Banda.

“Climate change is shifting the average,” says Abhiyant Tiwari, climate and health expert at New Delhi-based NRDC India. “While Banda has always been known for hot summers, what is changing right now is the intensity, the duration and the number of people exposed to dangerous heat conditions.”

High nighttime temperatures are especially worrying because they prevent people from recovering physically from the day’s heat, he says.

The top government official in Banda says authorities have responded by opening cooling centers, distributing hundreds of thousands of oral rehydration kits and monitoring hospitals during heat warnings.

Amit Aasery, the district magistrate of Banda, says officials are studying groundwater levels, soil moisture and vegetation loss while working to improve water supplies and public awareness.

But he says there is only so much they can do.

“What is happening here is a global phenomenon,” he says. “It is because of climate change. We are the recipient of this.”

Arasu reported from Bengaluru, India, and can be followed on X at @sibi123. Associated Press writer Seth Borenstein contributed to this report from Washington.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

An auto-rickshaw driver rests inside his vehicle during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Children gather around a mobile phone as local residents rest at a railway station to escape the heat in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20, 2026 (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Residents and stray dogs rest on the platform of a railway station to escape the heat in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Residents sleep on the platform of a railway station to escape the heat in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Birds cool off during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Bird conservationist Shobharam Kashyap installs a wooden birdhouse for sparrows during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Bird conservationist Shobharam Kashyap holds wooden birdhouses he makes for sparrows during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Laborers sit beside sacks of potatoes at a vegetable market in the early morning during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Munni Devi unloads tomatoes from a truck at a vegetable market in the early morning during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

A laborer carries vegetables at a market in the early morning during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Saturday, June 20 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Dr. Abhishek Pranayami examines a patient suffering from a heat-related illness amid high temperatures at a district government hospital in Banda, northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Friday, June 19, 2026 (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Dr. Abhishek Pranayami examines a child suffering from a heat-related illness amid high temperatures as the child's mother looks on at a government hospital during a heat wave Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Friday, June 19 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Dr. Abhishek Pranayami examines a patient suffering from a heat-related illness amid high temperatures at a district government hospital in Banda, northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Friday, June 19, 2026 (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

A woman cools herself off with an ice pack during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Sunday, June 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

A patient receiving oxygen lies on a hospital bed while suffering from a heat-related illness amid high temperatures during a heat wave in Banda, northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh, Friday, June 19 , 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iranian attacks targeted Bahrain and Kuwait early Thursday after the U.S. reimposed a naval blockade on Iran and intensified its airstrike campaign in retaliation for Tehran’s attacks on ships trying to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.

The American strikes hit an Iranian army barracks, killed at least seven troops and wounded hundreds of people across the country, Iranian officials said.

There was no immediate word on damage or casualties from the Iranian strikes.

Days of back-and-forth strikes by the U.S. and Iran across the Middle East — and renewed threats to the waterway crucial to global energy supplies — have shredded the interim deal to end the conflict and the region could tip back into all-out war.

The U.S. first imposed a blockade in April and lifted it last month after signing the interim deal that paused the fighting and set a 60-day period for negotiations over issues such as Iran’s nuclear program. Those talks have stalled as fighting over the Strait of Hormuz has intensified.

When the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the waterway to shipping traffic — a move that sent the price of oil, fertilizer and many other goods soaring far beyond the region and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations. Those rising prices pose a particular challenge to U.S. President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, which hopes to retain control of Congress in elections in November. But Washington has struggled to successfully reopen the waterway.

About 24 hours after the blockade went into effect, the U.S. military opened fire and disabled a merchant vessel.

Iran’s parliament speaker and lead negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said Iran was prepared for a fuller military confrontation if the U.S. does not live up to the terms of the interim deal, and Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened to halt all energy exports from the Middle East over the blockade.

“The export of oil and gas from the region will be either for everyone or for no one,” the Guard said.

Soon after the U.S. launched its third wave of strikes in 24 hours, Trump said Iran was ready to strike a peace deal, but he did not elaborate.

“They don’t like what we’re doing, and they do want to settle. We’ll find out whether or not we settle with them, or we just finish it off,” he said Wednesday at a defense summit at the U.S. Army War College in Pennsylvania.

Later Wednesday, Trump said on social media that Tehran made a “gesture of Goodwill” by releasing an American citizen wrongly detained in Iran since 2024. He didn't release further details. Human rights lawyer Jared Genser released a statement identifying the detainee as his client Dena Karari, a U.S.-Iranian citizen who runs a nonprofit and was charged with espionage.

The U.S. carried out a wave of strikes, hitting dozens of targets overnight, the military’s Central Command said Wednesday, and then resumed striking Iran during daylight — an unusual move that further signaled the increasing tempo of the attacks. Another wave of strikes began late Wednesday.

U.S. Central Command said it spotted Curacao-flagged oil tanker Belma sailing toward Kharg Island and, after the ship “ignored multiple warnings,” a U.S. aircraft disabled the merchant vessel by firing hellfire missiles into the ship’s smokestack.

In addition to the now-disabled Belma, the U.S. military said it had to speak with two other commercial vessels, but they complied with their instructions to turn away.

Among the U.S. military's targets was Greater Tunb Island, which is viewed as a strategic point in the Strait of Hormuz. Central Command said the attack targeted Iranian defense and missile sites.

Another strike targeted a barracks for Iran’s 388th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, which operates tanks and armored vehicles, in Sistan and Baluchestan province, Iranian state television reported. The report said Americans fired at least 13 missiles in the attack and the seven dead included conscripts and career soldiers. A number of troops were wounded.

More than 35 people have been killed and more than 300 wounded by U.S. airstrikes in recent days, said Hossein Kermanpour, a spokesperson for the Iranian Health Ministry. Kermanpour did not break down the figures between civilians and combatants.

The announcement marked the first overall toll given by Iranian authorities for this round of fighting. The number of wounded was far larger than for any other recent violence between Iran and the U.S. The army said it would make “a decisive response,” according to state TV.

U.S. Navy Adm. Brad Cooper, who leads Central Command, said in a statement that Iran had launched dozens of missiles and drones at neighboring Gulf Arab countries.

Missile-alert warnings sounded Wednesday in Bahrain and Kuwait as they faced incoming Iranian fire — a daily occurrence recently. In a post on X, Bahrain’s Interior Ministry urged people to “head to the nearest safe place.”

Jordan said it shot down three incoming Iranian missiles. Iran claimed attacks on the three nations, all of which host U.S. forces.

In a statement published online, Qalibaf said the United States had not lived up to the terms of the interim peace deal, which he said included “Iranian arrangements” over the Strait of Hormuz.

“Now that we have entered the implementation phase, the United States, having exhausted its legal and diplomatic options, is trying to undermine those Iranian arrangements through force,” he wrote.

Qalibaf's comments appeared aimed at critics within Iran who oppose negotiations with the U.S. He argued that negotiations should not be equated with compromise or surrender, but as part of a broader strategy of resistance.

The latest round of fighting is focused on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas trade passes during peacetime. How to reopen the strait has bedeviled the U.S. since Iran choked it off in the early days of the war.

During the interim deal, some ships began moving through the passage using a route near Oman overseen by the U.S. military that is outside Tehran’s control.

In recent days, Iran attacked ships using that route — and back-and-forth attacks ensued. The U.S. has threatened to reopen the strait by force — but experts say that would require a much bigger armada if not tens of thousands of ground troops. Imposing the blockade is another way to put pressure on Iran.

But in the meantime, oil prices are rising. The price for Brent crude oil, the international standard, traded above $85 a barrel on Wednesday — more than 15% higher than the price before the war, but still well below the nearly $120 reached at the height of the conflict.

Analysts with the International Monetary Fund warned Wednesday that while a surplus of oil had kept prices low, “much of that room has now been used up.”

“Unless inventories are replenished, the world will start from a weaker position when the next shock comes,” Azim Sadikov and Jean-Marc Natal wrote in a blog post.

Associated Press writers Michelle Price, Konstantin Toropin, Will Weissert, Collin Binkley and Fatima Hussein in Washington, Christopher Weber in Los Angeles, and Nasser Karimi in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.

A billboard depicting U.S. President Donald Trump lying on what appears to be a coffin and bearing anti-Trump messages, including the phrase "We Kill Trump," is seen at Islamic Revolution Square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

An army cadet walks past a billboard bearing anti-Trump messages, including the phrase "We Kill Trump," at Islamic Revolution Square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

A woman stands at the water's edge along the Strait of Hormuz as a plume of smoke rises in the background following an explosion, off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Monday, July 13, 2026. (Razieh Poudat/ISNA via AP)

Three boys play in the shallow waters of the Strait of Hormuz, as a plume of smoke rises from an explosion in the background, off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Monday, July 13, 2026. (Razieh Poudat/ISNA via AP)

Mourners chant slogan as one of them holds a poster of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei in a ceremony commemorating the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at the Imam Khomeini Mosalla Grand Mosque in Tehran, Tuesday, July 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)