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Massive Wildfires Burn From California to the Arctic Ocean as Temperature Records Shatter
12
July, 2017
Record
heavy precipitation and cooler conditions across Western North
America earlier
this year have again given way to record warmth as a strong high
pressure ridge and associated extreme Pacific and Arctic
Ocean surface
temperatures have ushered in blazing heat and multiplying wildfires.
In
California, massive wildfires have forced
nearly 5,000 people to evacuate.
In British Columbia, 14,000
have fled as
more than 1,000
firefighters battle numerous large blazes.
And along coastal Alaska and Canada’s Northwest Territory, large
wildfires are burning near the shores of an, until recently frozen,
Arctic Ocean.
(Large
wildfires spill plumes of smoke over major sections of North America
on July 11, 2017. Image source: NASA
Worldview.)
In
the U.S., the Whittier fire, which forced mandatory evacuations in
southern California, is
now 48 percent contained after having burned 12,000 acres.
In the north of the state, near Oroville, the
Alamo fire is 65 percent contained at 28,000 acres and evacuation
orders have been lifted.
As
large fires continue to burn across the west, the U.S.
Interagency Fire Center now
has a stated national preparedness level of 4 out of 5 — or the
second highest alert rating. So far 2017 has seen 3,593,000 acres
burned in the U.S. — which is above the 10 year average. An
average that
has already been pushed higher due to human-forced warming and an
overall lengthening of the fire season.
Further
north, British
Columbia is suffering a rash of severe fires as
extreme heat and high winds are blasting away at vegetation that
vigorously regrew when drought conditions retreated earlier this
year. Now, 215
active fires are reported as
the province mobilizes national military forces and considers
making calls for international aid.
Presently, 21
large fires are
causing considerable havoc throughout BC. Fire officials remain on
heightened alert as strong winds, heat, and lightning threaten to
make a bad fire situation even worse over the coming days.
Still
further north and extending all the way to the shores of the Arctic
Ocean, satellite photographs provided by NASA show large wildfires
burning through typically frozen regions of Canada’s Northwest
Territory and in northern Alaska. Many of these fires are quite
vigorous — producing large smoke plumes that have blanked much of
the region.
(Fires
burning near the Arctic Ocean on July 10, 2017. For reference, bottom
edge of frame is 280 miles. Image source: NASA
Worldview.)
Such
widespread burning over such a large region of North America —
extending from California to the Arctic Ocean — has
been spurred primarily by record heat building beneath a massive high
pressure ridge.
In the far North, temperatures approached
90 degrees Fahrenheit just south of the Mackenzie Delta near the
Arctic Ocean earlier this week.
Over typically cool British Columbia, temperatures have
consistently ranged in the 80s and
are expected to again heat up to near 90 (F) this week. And in the
U.S. Southwest, numerous temperature records were
broken over recent days as readings rocketed into the 100s and 110s.
Both
the heat and these massive fires have likely been made worse by human
caused climate change. Overall, global temperatures have
recently hit around 1.2 C above 1880s averages.
As a result, over 80 percent of the globe, heatwaves
are both more severe and more likely to occur.
Meanwhile, due to climate change related factors, the western
wildfire season in the U.S. is
now 105 days longer than it was in 1970 —
just 47 years ago. Arctic sea ice retreat in recent years has likely
accompanied further warming of the far northern land masses which
have also seen increasingly
severe wildfires over permafrost zones.
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