Tuesday, July 20, 2021

Our Burning World

 


Fed by hot, dry winds, America's biggest wildfire burned through more acreage in a southern Oregon forest with more than 2,100 residents near the California border ordered from their homes. The fire named Bootleg grew by an additional 4,000 acres overnight to nearly 304,000 acres (123,020 hectares.) 2,200 fire-fighting personnel battling the fire. The Bootleg fire is the largest of 80 active wildfires that have burned nearly 1.2 million acres in 13 states and are being battled by more than 19,600 firefighters and support personnel.

"This fire is large and moving so fast, every day it progresses 4 to 5 miles," said Oregon Department of Forestry Incident Commander Joe Hassel. 

In California, the Dixie fire has burned more than over 30,000 acres (12,140 hectares) as more than 1,900 fire-fighters attempted to contain it. The Dixie fire, the biggest in the state, prompted some evacuation orders for Plumas and Butte counties.

Meanwhile, in Russia's Siberian region,  planes seeded clouds to bring rain to dampen huge wildfires. Amid a heatwave, forest fires have burned through over 1.5 million hectares of land in Yakutia, the worst-hit region. Around 123 fires raged on Monday over an area of more than 885,000 hectares, In less than two months, fires in the region have spewed out around 150 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent - close to the 2017 annual fossil fuel emissions of Venezuela, according to the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS), part of a European Union observation programme.

Meantime, in Europe,  water-carrying planes battled to control a wildfire in Spain's Costa Brava region that has forced 350 people to be evacuated from their homes.

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