Wildfires in Canada have now burned more than 25 million acres of land, a new record, and experts warn there’s end in sight yet.
At least one casualty has been reported: a firefighter who was killed after a tree fell on her last Thursday, according to Bloomberg.
The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center reported more than 900 active fires as of Saturday, July 15. Resources are being mobilized from across federal departments and the Canadian army.
“Firefighters and emergency management personnel in British Columbia are working tirelessly,” said Bill Blair, Canada’s emergency preparedness minister, in a tweet.
Several oil, logging, and mining operations across the country are being heavily impacted by fires raging in British Columbia.
According to a report by CNN, the smoke from the wildfires is forecasted to put over 70 million US residents under air quality alerts as there is set to be decreased visibility and poor air quality over a dozen states.
Last month, the smoke from the wildfires in Quebec spread to the US East Coast, dg New York City the world’s most polluted city on June 7.
Experts told CNBC that the wildfires will only continue to be worsened by the changes in the earth’s temperature.
“The warmer it gets, the atmosphere gets more efficient at sucking the moisture out of the fuels,” said Michael Flannigan, the research chair for predictive services, emergency management and fire science at Thompson Rivers University British Columbia, in the report.
Flannigan added that warmer temperatures cause more lightning, which starts half of the wildfires in Canada.
As climate change worsens and causes extreme weather conditions to fluctuate, the wildfires are expected to continue being above normal. The Canadian government reported that the annual number of forests burned is estimated to double by 2050.
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