100+ Zombie Fires Burning Now In BC; After North Dakota-Sized Area Of Canada Burned In 2023, 2024 Outlook Turning Grim

The first week of January isn't usually wildfire season. But as 2024 began, more than 100 "zombie fires" were actively burning in British Columbia — holdovers from last summer that typically go dormant over winter. "That is mind boggling to me. Just unheard of," said Lori Daniels, a professor with the University of British Columbia's department of forest and conservation sciences.

The warm, dry weather that capped off what is expected to be declared the planet's hottest year on record — and Canada's most destructive wildfire season by a longshot, with more than 6,500 fires burning close to 19 million hectares — is not over. With the global El Niño weather system continuing through this spring, forecasts suggest 2024 could be even hotter — prompting wildfire and public policy experts to call for more wildfire prevention efforts now. "The whole concept of business as usual is out the window," said John Robinson, a professor at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy and the School of the Environment at the University of Toronto, adding governments, NGOs and social support organizations have to learn to be more adaptive.

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Tom Di Liberto, climate scientist and public affairs specialist with NOAA, said when El Niño events straddle two years, it is typically the second year that ends up being hotter, indicating a strong possibility that temperatures could increase again in 2024. A recent example was 2016, the previous hottest year on record following El Niño. "When you have back-to-back years of such extreme temperatures, it's kind of allowing the possibility to be a bit more severe," Di Liberto said.

Kevin Hanna, director of the University of British Columbia's Centre for Environmental Assessment Research and a former wildfire fighter, says the increasingly extreme heat and drought conditions have led people in disaster-prone regions to develop a "fear of summer and what it will bring." "Is this the summer where my farm or ranch gets hit? Is this the summer when my town has to evacuate? You see it on people's face, you hear it in their voice," " Hanna said. "I know ranchers who have lost property— terrible flood damage, terrible wildfire damage."

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https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/wildfire-preparation-2024-1.7074748