The heat is on: Temps climb into the triple-digits in L.A. County

As the clock ticked on, the sun continued to shine and the mercury continued its climb toward record temperatures across Los Angeles County on Monday afternoon.

By 2 p.m. several cities were close to marking heat records, an official from the Naitional Weather Service said. A few records could be broken by 4 p.m.

It was 91 degrees downtown. The record is 98 for the date, but the average for this time of year is a T-shirt-and-shorts-friendly 74 degrees. It was 103 in Beverly Hills.

The National Weather Service issued a hazardous weather outlook for Southern California, warning people vulnerable to the heat to stay indoors or in air-conditioned buildings. Sailors far off shore were expected to have gale-force winds to contend with.

Cities across L.A. County were on the brink of breaking heat records.

“Today is going to be very close to yesterday,” when record-high temperatures baked Burbank and Lancaster, among other cities, National Weather Service meteorologist Dave Bruno said.

Burbank’s record of 103 and Woodland Hills’ 104-degree record could both be topped Monday, forecasters said. Temperatures were expected to climb to between 98 and 104 in the valleys, Bruno said.

It’s expected to be up to 10 degrees cooler along the coasts, he said.

Though the weather is extremely dry and hot, a lack of wind means that Southern California won’t see any red-flag fire warnings Monday. However, the danger of fire remains high, Bruno said.

The heat wave is expected to break later Monday, forecasters said, with temperatures gradually dropping off through the rest of the week.

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Joseph.serna@latimes.com

@josephserna