The world’s eight most extreme wildfire weather years have occurred in the last decade, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Alberta, Canada. The study suggests that extreme fire weather is being driven by a decrease in atmospheric humidity coupled with rising temperatures.
“Extreme conditions drive the world’s fire activity,” said Michael Flannigan, a former University of Alberta wildfire expert, who conducted the research with study lead Piyush Jain, a research scientist with Natural Resources Canada, and Sean Coogan, a postdoctoral fellow at the Faculty of Agricultural, Life and Environmental Sciences.
Flannigan continued: “For example, in Canada, just three per cent of fires are responsible for 97 per cent of the area burned.”
For the study, the team examined extreme fire weather trends from 1979 to 2020 using common fire weather indexes that provide estimates for fire intensity and rate of fire spread, as well as changes...