Canada keeps the wildfires burning; Rochester keeps breathing the smoke
Aug. 29—Dear Answer Man: I would like to see a map of the wildfires in Canada. — Carolyn.
Dear Carolyn,
Ask and ye shall receive.
The nice (they are Canadian after all) folks at Natural Resources Canada and the
Canadian Wildland Fire Information System
have a website where you check in on those wildfires all the livelong day.
NASA's
Fire Information for Resource Management System US/Canada
has its own view of the wildfires. Either way, we can see blazes across America's polite neighbor to the north.
Of course, Canada is rather famously (infamously?) experiencing the worst wildfires in that nation's history.
Quinn Barber, fire research analyst for the Canadian Forest Service, said although fire activity has waned in recent weeks, the 2023 fire season is still far from over and, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, there were still 1,033 active wildfires in Canada, 656 of which are out of control, as of Friday, Aug. 25.
"There are several reasons why extinguishing a large wildfire is so challenging," Barber said. "In the case of the large wildfires we've been observing this year, we could have every firefighter in the world and we still wouldn't be able to put them out. Once fire behavior exceeds a certain threshold, what we sometimes refer to as extreme fire behavior, direct attack with pumps and even water bombers can't stop a large wildfire. At this point, the only tool that works is planned ignition, which is to carefully and intentionally light a fire in front of the wildfire's advance in an effort to starve it of fuel."
The sad fact, Barber said, is that Canada has seen nearly 15 million hectares burned so far in 2023, which makes this the largest fire season by area since anyone has been around to keep track. Record-breaking temperatures and drought are contributing factors as are a high number of lightning-caused ignitions across the country, he said, which have caused many wildfires in remote places that are incredibly difficult to access and so are likewise difficult to combat.
Fires can continue through the summer and fall, burning until winter snowfalls put them out.
"That's likely to be the case this year," Barber said. "Rarely a fire can smolder underground until it starts spreading the following year."
And if you're hoping that this year's fires will have burned all the dry wood in Canada, meaning 2024 will be relatively fire-free, think again. Barber said Canada has over 360 million hectares of forest, so less than 5% of it has burned this year.
By comparison, he added, during the 2019-2020 bush fires in Australia, nearly 20% of Australia's forests burned. When that happened, it's what fire scientists call a "fire-depleted forest." But Canada hasn't reached that level.
"There are plenty of forests left to burn," Barber said.
Other than just our compassion for our Canadian neighbors, for Minnesotans, we care because the smoke from those fires has tinted the skies here in Southeast Minnesota — actually, across the northern part of the U.S. — throughout the summer. That smoke brought health warnings from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency on a regular basis.
As recently as Thursday, pretty much all of Minnesota south of Alexandria and east of Marshall — about a quarter of the state — was under "moderate" air quality level. That means there is increased ground level ozone that can cause difficulty breathing deeply, shortness of breath, sore throat, wheezing and coughing, and fatigue, according to the MPCA. Furthermore, people with asthma and COPD can see their conditions worsen due to ozone.
We've also seen a lot of air quality that has been rated "unhealthy for sensitive groups" this summer. That can bring the additional problems of chest pain and bring added trouble for anyone with cardiovascular and heart disease.
To say the fires have caused problems across North America is an understatement.
At this point, the answer is to pray for rain, cooler temperatures and an easing of the fires in Canada. I'm glad, Carolyn, we could give you a way to see just how significant the problem has been and continues to be.
Now I'm going to have some back bacon with a little maple syrup as a show of solidarity for my northern friends.
Any burning questions? Send them to Answer Man at
.
