Giant thermometer set up in ‘Japan’s hottest city’

The famed thermometer, installed Friday in front of Yagihashi department store in Kumagaya, Saitama Prefecture, has been displayed every summer since it was first set up 14 years ago. It is scheduled to remain there through the end of August.

After the local weather bureau announces the temperature at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., the thermometer is adjusted manually to reflect the reading.

Many people came to take photographs of the thermometer when the temperature hit 41.1C in 2018, the highest temperature ever recorded in Japan, matched in 2020 by Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture.

“Please be more careful than last year about the coronavirus pandemic and heat stroke due to the wearing of masks,” said an executive officer of the department store.