How hot could my car get on a sunny 32F day for a couple hours?
February 11, 2025 6:07 PM Subscribe
I went to a meeting at a library and left the dog in the car. 30F when I parked. v. light breeze. Could it have gotten hot enough to be unsafe?
She's a shaggy poodle (winter- few trims) wearing a thin sweater. I didn't think she needed the heat on, meeting was 1 1/2 - 2 hours. Car was parked facing west. Did not open a window, the car is not that airtight. Someone called 911. A smart person eventually came and found me in the library, but a sheriff had arrived. The car was unlocked, my phone # was in the dash. The dog's fur on her head was cool to touch, she did not appear distressed, just excited because, what's going on? Sheriff insisted I open a window 2", which, okay, I guess, but the car was maybe 60F, residual heat from having gotten it warm on the way. I don't think it could have gotten warm enough to be uncomfortable, and certainly not dangerous. Southern Maine, where the sun is stronger but still pretty oblique, and sets at 5 pm. I would never want her to come to harm, but this concern felt over the top.
She did not have water; no matter what dish I provide, she will knock over water in the car. 2 of my other tasks for the day were pet-visits for walk/play dates. She gets bored at home.
She's a shaggy poodle (winter- few trims) wearing a thin sweater. I didn't think she needed the heat on, meeting was 1 1/2 - 2 hours. Car was parked facing west. Did not open a window, the car is not that airtight. Someone called 911. A smart person eventually came and found me in the library, but a sheriff had arrived. The car was unlocked, my phone # was in the dash. The dog's fur on her head was cool to touch, she did not appear distressed, just excited because, what's going on? Sheriff insisted I open a window 2", which, okay, I guess, but the car was maybe 60F, residual heat from having gotten it warm on the way. I don't think it could have gotten warm enough to be uncomfortable, and certainly not dangerous. Southern Maine, where the sun is stronger but still pretty oblique, and sets at 5 pm. I would never want her to come to harm, but this concern felt over the top.
She did not have water; no matter what dish I provide, she will knock over water in the car. 2 of my other tasks for the day were pet-visits for walk/play dates. She gets bored at home.
Best answer: Over the top. They didn’t even try the door handle?? People need to get a life.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 6:19 PM on February 11 [10 favorites]
posted by St. Peepsburg at 6:19 PM on February 11 [10 favorites]
I highly doubt the sun would be able to bring the temperature up to comfortable levels let alone something dangerous. Maybe put a thermometer in the car one day to see how hot it can get.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:26 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:26 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
Common sense tells me it's ridiculous to think it could get too hot under these conditions. I would feel fine about leaving my dog in the car on a sunny 32F day, and I'm sure I've done it. But just to check my intuition, I found an inside car temperature calculator. It tells me that after 2 hours at 32F the expected inside temperature would be 77. Sounds pretty darn safe to me.
posted by Redstart at 6:39 PM on February 11 [2 favorites]
posted by Redstart at 6:39 PM on February 11 [2 favorites]
To answer your question, clearly heat wasn't an issue based on your own observations. But you already knew that before you asked so I'm assuming you are wondering about other things.
this concern felt over the top
I think the sheriff wasn't behaving this way so much out of "concern" but because of the laws in Maine. Whether or not you think they are overblown, you should probably know what the law is. There is something about "ventilation" so it might not have had to do with the heat at all.
https://mfoa.net/companion/know-maine-law-pets-unattended-vehicles
As you can see on that webpage, there is a lot of encouragement for the public to contact authorities if they see an animal in a car. Whether or not this is actually dangerous, because of this type of messaging, you are likely to have people calling about your dog if you leave her in the car.
It seems like you live in a nice area where people care a lot about dogs and their well being. There are much worse things that can happen to expensive breeds of dogs left alone in unlocked cars. I'm glad that your dog is OK.
posted by yohko at 6:42 PM on February 11 [13 favorites]
this concern felt over the top
I think the sheriff wasn't behaving this way so much out of "concern" but because of the laws in Maine. Whether or not you think they are overblown, you should probably know what the law is. There is something about "ventilation" so it might not have had to do with the heat at all.
https://mfoa.net/companion/know-maine-law-pets-unattended-vehicles
As you can see on that webpage, there is a lot of encouragement for the public to contact authorities if they see an animal in a car. Whether or not this is actually dangerous, because of this type of messaging, you are likely to have people calling about your dog if you leave her in the car.
It seems like you live in a nice area where people care a lot about dogs and their well being. There are much worse things that can happen to expensive breeds of dogs left alone in unlocked cars. I'm glad that your dog is OK.
posted by yohko at 6:42 PM on February 11 [13 favorites]
I used to straighten warped violin and cello bridges by soaking them in boiling water, then flattening them on a board and clamping them down. Then I would put the whole apparatus in the back window of my car. Even on a cold day, if the sun was out, within two hours the wood would be completely dried out and the metal clamp would be too hot to touch. This taught me that a car is basically a solar oven. Why we heat houses with natural gas instead of the sun is beyond me. But the temperature thing is not something I would second guess with an animal inside.
posted by jabah at 8:59 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
posted by jabah at 8:59 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
Best answer: Good lord. I live in a cold climate and leave my dog in the car in these temps all the time. It's never been anything but cold when I came back. I don't even start thinking about it until it's in the 40s. I can't believe someone would call 911 in literally freezing temperatures. Maybe if they thought the dog was too *cold*? And then all the dumb cop knew about was dogs in hot cars? I'm baffled.
posted by HotToddy at 9:56 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
posted by HotToddy at 9:56 PM on February 11 [1 favorite]
Best answer: Imagine you were deciding whether to wait in the car for an hour or two on a 32 degree day while someone else was in a meeting. Is there any chance in the world you'd be thinking you might get too hot?
posted by Redstart at 10:17 PM on February 11 [4 favorites]
posted by Redstart at 10:17 PM on February 11 [4 favorites]
Best answer: That was ridiculous.
Granted, people shouldn't get complacent because, "it's a cool day." I once put a thermometer in a car in a day when the outdoor temp stayed mostly in the 60s and briefly topped out at 72 degrees F. The thermometer inside went about 10 degrees beyond the last number, which was 120. Yow!
But your day wasn't cool; it was below freezing! Winter sunlight making the car dangerously hot? Someone needs to think a little better.
posted by wjm at 2:33 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
Granted, people shouldn't get complacent because, "it's a cool day." I once put a thermometer in a car in a day when the outdoor temp stayed mostly in the 60s and briefly topped out at 72 degrees F. The thermometer inside went about 10 degrees beyond the last number, which was 120. Yow!
But your day wasn't cool; it was below freezing! Winter sunlight making the car dangerously hot? Someone needs to think a little better.
posted by wjm at 2:33 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
Best answer: I once got a similar amount of hassled for leaving the carrier crate with the two kittens I'd just taken to get vaccinated in my car for the fifteen minutes it took me to do a quick supermarket stop on the way home. I live half an hour from the town with the vet and the supermarket in it, so this struck me as a sensible use of my time.
I'm in Australia so the day on which I did this was sunny and pleasant rather than icy cold, and to allow for that I made sure to park the car in the shade of a tree and leave all the windows rolled down by about four inches. There was a gentle breeze blowing, and before leaving the car I'd sat in it for long enough to make sure that the interior was not getting any hotter than the pleasant day outside.
But nothing says "neglect" to the general public more than a stone-deaf cat yowling because she wants out of her crate, and by the time I got back to the car there was a crowd around it and a cop. All of them were very keen to let me know what an irresponsible prick I was. Not one of them had actually opened any of the unlocked doors, nor even stuck a hand in through any of the opened windows, to check the actual interior temperature. Which was, naturally, exactly as I'd left it.
The point of relating all this is that the general public has no grasp of physics. All it takes is a few media stories about irresponsible mothers (it's always the mothers, because of course) leaving babies to cook in closed cars while they go play the pokies, and suddenly every unattended car is a death oven by definition. The questions of how heat energy builds up inside glazed spaces and the conditions under which it might do so to a dangerous extent do not even arise. Some parked car somewhere has killed a baby and that is as far as the reasoning ever goes.
In my case, it turned out that what the cop was actually salty about was my having left the car unlocked and caused him a callout. Which, OK, fair, even though the low crime rate is one of the reasons I moved out here in the first place.
posted by flabdablet at 5:59 AM on February 12 [1 favorite]
I'm in Australia so the day on which I did this was sunny and pleasant rather than icy cold, and to allow for that I made sure to park the car in the shade of a tree and leave all the windows rolled down by about four inches. There was a gentle breeze blowing, and before leaving the car I'd sat in it for long enough to make sure that the interior was not getting any hotter than the pleasant day outside.
But nothing says "neglect" to the general public more than a stone-deaf cat yowling because she wants out of her crate, and by the time I got back to the car there was a crowd around it and a cop. All of them were very keen to let me know what an irresponsible prick I was. Not one of them had actually opened any of the unlocked doors, nor even stuck a hand in through any of the opened windows, to check the actual interior temperature. Which was, naturally, exactly as I'd left it.
The point of relating all this is that the general public has no grasp of physics. All it takes is a few media stories about irresponsible mothers (it's always the mothers, because of course) leaving babies to cook in closed cars while they go play the pokies, and suddenly every unattended car is a death oven by definition. The questions of how heat energy builds up inside glazed spaces and the conditions under which it might do so to a dangerous extent do not even arise. Some parked car somewhere has killed a baby and that is as far as the reasoning ever goes.
In my case, it turned out that what the cop was actually salty about was my having left the car unlocked and caused him a callout. Which, OK, fair, even though the low crime rate is one of the reasons I moved out here in the first place.
posted by flabdablet at 5:59 AM on February 12 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Two homeless men froze to death the other night. The 911 system was used to summon a sheriff regarding a dog on a cold sunny day. Apparently, the police in my neighboring town were asked to go to my home to try to find me (I was parked in the small town library parking lot, was in the not-crowded library; the concerned caller did not come looking for me). The dog did not appear distressed or ill. She was wiggling around the front seats in response to attention; she's a dog and mildly territorial and slightly barky. When I came out and talked to the sheriff, the concerned caller was there and glared at me. I care about dogs, but there's a trend of overwhelming concern about pets. and not about people sleeping outside in single digit temps. My axe-grindy attitude is about the imbalance, the glaring, the lack of common sense, use of 1st responder resources, and, yeah, I felt accused. But also checking to make sure I'm not being really stupid and unsafe.
I do plan to get a thermometer to hang from the rear view mirror. Man, it was so much easier when I had a little dog that curled up and slept in the car.
posted by theora55 at 9:21 AM on February 12 [3 favorites]
I do plan to get a thermometer to hang from the rear view mirror. Man, it was so much easier when I had a little dog that curled up and slept in the car.
posted by theora55 at 9:21 AM on February 12 [3 favorites]
Honestly, getting into a car when it's 30-ish degrees in the morning would make me worry that your dog is too cold, rather than too hot. It takes like 15 minutes for my car to heat up enough to be tolerable when blasting the heat as high as it can go in the morning. I'm not sure how long your car stays warm, but mine doesn't really warm up on its own unless bright sunlight has been going on for awhile.
Also, I'd leave a window open no matter what, just in case. Sealed dog in a can doesn't look great to observers, as flabdablet points out.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:21 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
Also, I'd leave a window open no matter what, just in case. Sealed dog in a can doesn't look great to observers, as flabdablet points out.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:21 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
Actually what I pointed out was that observers don't even bother to think about whether the can is sealed. Mine certainly wasn't; four windows each opened four inches and personal verification that the prevailing breeze was in fact through-ventilating the car.
If the aim is to keep a car interior warm enough to keep a dog comfortable while the outside temperature is at freezing point, you couldn't possibly do better than parking a pre-warmed car with the biggest glass area facing what remained of the available direct sunlight and closing all the windows to slow the warm air leakage rate as much as possible. You want the greenhouse effect working for you under those circumstances. Anybody who looks at that setup and concludes that the dog is in danger of being cooked is basically just stupid.
An interior logging thermometer will satisfy your own curiosity, but trying to use one to stop other people calling the cops on you is unlikely to work. Not even if it had a huge and obvious display, like iPad size. All that would achieve is making it an attractive target for theft, though the presence of a somewhat barky dog might help a bit there.
posted by flabdablet at 9:37 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
If the aim is to keep a car interior warm enough to keep a dog comfortable while the outside temperature is at freezing point, you couldn't possibly do better than parking a pre-warmed car with the biggest glass area facing what remained of the available direct sunlight and closing all the windows to slow the warm air leakage rate as much as possible. You want the greenhouse effect working for you under those circumstances. Anybody who looks at that setup and concludes that the dog is in danger of being cooked is basically just stupid.
An interior logging thermometer will satisfy your own curiosity, but trying to use one to stop other people calling the cops on you is unlikely to work. Not even if it had a huge and obvious display, like iPad size. All that would achieve is making it an attractive target for theft, though the presence of a somewhat barky dog might help a bit there.
posted by flabdablet at 9:37 AM on February 12 [2 favorites]
Best answer: For what it's worth, it's very common in dog sports (agility, nosework) to leave dogs in cars for multiple hours during trials. In warmer weather, people will have all sorts of gear including full car aluminet coverings, super powered fans, etc to keep dogs cool. But in this kind of weather? Just leave the dog in the car.
Honestly, on a 32F day, leaving the windows open seems like a much worse idea. Why would you want to let the cold air in?
posted by litera scripta manet at 8:01 PM on February 13 [2 favorites]
Honestly, on a 32F day, leaving the windows open seems like a much worse idea. Why would you want to let the cold air in?
posted by litera scripta manet at 8:01 PM on February 13 [2 favorites]
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