Vietnam swelters with its highest temperature ever recorded

A family make their way around the city on a scooter in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Photo / File, supplied

Vietnam broke its all-time record high national temperature at the weekend, the latest in a string of records to fall as the word continues to warm.

The scorcher set the mercury soaring to 43.4C in the community of Huong Khe, a rural district in Ha Tinh Province. It's situated in Vietnam's north central coast region, about 240km south of the capital Hanoi. Its average temperature is in the 20s at this time of year.

Forty-three degrees is enough to soften your crayons, liquify chocolate, and warm the temperature inside a parked car past 60C.

The record was first reported by Etienne Kapikian, a forecaster with MeteoFrance, France's meteorological agency.

Sweltering heat covered the entire Indochina peninsula over the weekend. Da Nang hit 37.7C. Hue topped 40.5.

Much of Vietnam's southern third has held in the 30s the past few days. Ho Chi Minh City "only" saw a high of 35C on Monday.

What makes the heat even more striking is that it's only April. Most places in Vietnam see their hottest temperatures in June or July.

Nguyen Vo lives in Da Nang. She's part of a team that just concluded an environmental governance project with the US Embassy in Vietnam. "We have a quote in Vietnamese," she joked. "There are two seasons here: hot and hotter."

But lately, the heat has been brutal.

"We've been scorching hot. The weather has been a bit strange lately. I had to purchase clothes for cold weather in February, but it ended up being so warm I didn't use them."

Phuong Hoang was in Hue when the temperatures climbed above 37C. "It is unbreathable outside in this heat," she wrote. "The temperature at 6am is already 85-88 degrees (30C)." And that's before the sun even comes up.

The heat's not just uncomfortable, she said. It's taking a toll on residents.

"It is so hard to carry on your day in this," she wrote. "But people have to. That's the sad part."

Air conditioning in Vietnam is primarily only available to wealthier individuals. And that sort of privilege is rare - the average monthly salary for most workers is less than US$150 a month.

Hoang says the hot weather comes on the heels of a dry 2018. "Due to lack of rain, the hydropower dams are working with little water upstream."

Hoang works with government and private sector leaders to arrange educational programs studying climate impacts in Vietnam. Now, she's getting a firsthand glimpse of just how bad things will continue to get.

"It affects our daily life."

The heat record record follows news that March was the second warmest on record for the globe.