All posts tagged: Wildfires

Watch Duty Is Adding Flood Alerts to Its Wildfire App

Watch Duty Is Adding Flood Alerts to Its Wildfire App

Published by skeptic

Watch Duty, the wildfire alert app, is introducing flood alerts to its popular disaster-awareness service. This is the second disaster type to be broadly included, after wildfires; it’s available as a free update. If you have the app, allow it to track your location, and happen to be near a flood zone, Watch Duty will send you a push notification with more information about the flood. The nonprofit started in 2021 with a focus on California’s wildfires. The app has since expanded to the entire US, where it uses a combination of paid employee “reporters” and many more volunteers who monitor emergency responder radio channels and translate that information about disaster zones to app users. Watch Duty became a critical resource during the Palisades and Eaton fires in Los Angeles last year, providing real-time information about the fire’s movements that users came to rely on. In the year since, Watch Duty has capitalized on that increased recognition and brought in thousands of new users and partnerships, including one with Amazon’s Ring cameras that lets people …

Europe mobilises largest firefighting response to tackle EU wildfires

Europe mobilises largest firefighting response to tackle EU wildfires

Published by skeptic

The European Commission has unveiled its most extensive wildfire preparedness operation to date, deploying hundreds of firefighters and a reinforced aerial fleet across southern Europe ahead of the 2026 fire season. The move comes as EU wildfires continue to grow in frequency, intensity and duration due to increasingly extreme weather conditions. A total of 777 firefighters from 14 European countries will be stationed in wildfire-prone regions including Cyprus, Greece, Italy, France, Spain, and Portugal. The personnel will be supported by 22 firefighting aircraft and five helicopters that are on standby to assist countries facing severe outbreaks. The expanded response aims to strengthen Europe’s ability to contain major fires quickly, reduce damage to communities and ecosystems, and provide rapid assistance when national emergency services become overwhelmed. Hadja Lahbib, Commissioner for Equality, Preparedness and Crisis Management, believes the response will be instrumental in protecting European lives and infrastructure: “When fires threaten communities, Europe responds as one. “I am proud of the firefighters pre-positioned in high-risk areas around Europe before disaster strikes, ready to help wherever they are …

How Wine, Truffles and Honey Could Help Europe Fight Wildfires

How Wine, Truffles and Honey Could Help Europe Fight Wildfires

Published by Sam Flores

Flames engulfed a forest in Catalonia, Spain, ripping across a wooded expanse and heading straight for hundred of acres of pines and underbrush. But before it reached them, the inferno encountered Celler Abadal, an 800-year-old family vineyard that sprawls across the red-clay hills. As the fire approached the tidy rows of grapes, separated from the tree line by only a few yards of barren soil, a strange thing happened. The blaze stopped. It was an example, in 2017, of an unexpected piece of good news. Certain landscapes, including vineyards, can help to slow or even partly stop runaway forest fires. “It’s not only that it is beautiful,” said Ramón Roqueta, the owner of Celler Abadal, walking across his terraced vineyard on a sunny day this month, pointing out a largely treeless hill where flames once raged. “It’s also making the area more resilient.” Wildfires in Europe are growing more intense and catastrophic over time. Last year, the continent experienced its worst wildfire season since records began in 2006, with nearly 2.5 million acres scorched. Already, …

California’s Wildfire Season Is Already Overactive

California’s Wildfire Season Is Already Overactive

Published by skeptic

It’s May, but California is already getting a taste of what peak fire season could look like, as out of control blazes pose a danger to infrastructure and some of the most threatened trees on the planet. A combination of high winds and heat has contributed to a trio of major fires in Southern California. The largest among them is the Santa Rosa Island Fire, which started over the weekend in Channel Islands National Park after a stranded sailor used flares to signal for help. The blaze has consumed roughly 16,600 acres—almost a third of the entire island. While some structures have been lost, the biggest is a grove of Torrey pines, which are among the rarest trees in the world. Torrey pines are considered critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The group has warned that the grove on the island faces “high potential risk from destructive fires.” While the Santa Rosa Island Fire burned through the grove, there’s hope that the worst-case scenario may not have come to pass. “Upon …

Floatation tanks deployed to combat PTSD after devastating wildfires

Floatation tanks deployed to combat PTSD after devastating wildfires

Published by skeptic

Often found in high-end spas, floatation tanks have shown promise for relieving PTSD dave stamboulis / Alamy A shipping container holding three mobile floatation tanks is en route to Maui, Hawaii, to tackle a mental health crisis caused by one of the deadliest wildfires in US history. While mostly found in high-end spas, floatation tanks have shown promise as a treatment for anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). If the roll-out is successful, fleets of the tanks could be sent to disaster zones all over the world. In August 2023, a series of wildfires erupted on Maui, the worst of which killed 102 people and destroyed thousands of homes and businesses. In the years since, risk of depression and anxiety have increased by more than half, and there are fears of an unfolding epidemic of PTSD. “Maui does not have an infrastructure to deal with a mental health crisis of this magnitude,” says Justin Feinstein, a clinical neuropsychologist who set up the non-profit Float Research Collective. “People are self-medicating. There’s a lot of alcohol use; there’s …

Floatation tanks deployed to combat PTSD after devastating wildfires

Flotation tanks deployed to combat PTSD after devastating wildfires

Published by skeptic

Often found in high-end spas, flotation tanks have shown promise for relieving PTSD dave stamboulis / Alamy A shipping container holding three mobile flotation tanks is en route to Maui, Hawaii, to tackle a mental health crisis caused by one of the deadliest wildfires in US history. While mostly found in high-end spas, flotation tanks have shown promise as a treatment for anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). If the roll-out is successful, fleets of the tanks could be sent to disaster zones all over the world. In August 2023, a series of wildfires erupted on Maui, the worst of which killed 102 people and destroyed thousands of homes and businesses. In the years since, risks of depression and anxiety have been higher within wildfire burn zones, and there are fears of an unfolding epidemic of PTSD. “Maui does not have an infrastructure to deal with a mental health crisis of this magnitude,” says Justin Feinstein, a clinical neuropsychologist who set up the non-profit Float Research Collective. “People are self-medicating. There’s a lot of alcohol use; …

How space and AI outpace wildfires

How space and AI outpace wildfires

Published by skeptic

In the world of disaster management, tracking data about fire is only useful if it arrives before the smoke does The image of a wildland fire is no longer a distant threat confined to remote wilderness. In recent years, ‘mega-fires’ have rewritten the rules of disaster management, leaping across traditional firebreaks and threatening urban fringes from the Mediterranean to the sub-Arctic. As climate change accelerates the frequency of these extreme events, the tools we use to track and fight them must evolve from reactive to predictive. At the forefront of this evolution is RSS-Hydro, a science-led geospatial tech company known primarily for its leadership in satellite Earth Observation (EO) and modelling intelligence. Through its FireSENS and FireSENS-GEO applications, RSS-Hydro is proving that the best way to fight fire is with actionable, rapid-response data. FireSENS: Delivering critical impacts in real-time In the escalating battle against wildfires, timely and comprehensive information is the most valuable asset. RSS-Hydro’s FireSENS represents a leap forward, providing multi-faceted wildfire impact intelligence that bridges the gap between raw data and life-saving action. …

Arctic fires are releasing carbon stored for thousands of years

Arctic fires are releasing carbon stored for thousands of years

Published by skeptic

A wildfire rips through the boreal forest in Manitoba, Canada, in 2025 Anadolu via Getty Images The wildfires that have been raging in many places around the Arctic in recent years could be contributing much more to global warming than currently thought. It has been assumed that what’s burning is mostly recent plant growth, but a study of soil cores from around the Arctic and boreal regions has shown that these fires are igniting stored carbon that is up to 5000 years old. “Soil combustion could unlock long-stored carbon from soils that have been considered previously as carbon sinks,” says Meri Ruppel at the Finnish Meteorological Institute in Helsinki. Currently, climate models don’t take the release of this ancient carbon into account. Plants grow slowly in the cold conditions of the Arctic, but their remains can accumulate in soil in forms such as peat, building up over centuries and millennia. This means soils in the Arctic and in the boreal forests nearby have been acting as a carbon sink – that is, helping to remove …

Prosecutors Say Arson Suspect in Los Angeles’ Palisades Fire Was Angry ‘At the World’

Prosecutors Say Arson Suspect in Los Angeles’ Palisades Fire Was Angry ‘At the World’

Published by Sam Flores

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The man accused of sparking the deadly Palisades Fire in Los Angeles was upset that he didn’t have plans for New Year’s Eve and ranted about being angry at the world before the initial blaze was sparked, according to court documents filed by prosecutors. Rinderknecht’s trial is set to begin June 8. His attorneys say he is being used as a scapegoat for the Los Angeles Fire Department’s failure to fully extinguish the earlier blaze. An outline of the prosecutors’ strategy — with details about the defendant’s alleged state of mind on the night before the first fire began — appears in an April 29 pretrial memo filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Witnesses reported that Rinderknecht had been driving erratically while on Uber routes around the Palisades on New Year’s Eve, said prosecutors. His passengers described him as “angry, intense, driving erratically, and ranting about being ‘pissed off at the world,’” the memo said. According to court filings, Rinderknecht ranted to passengers about accused UnitedHealthcare CEO shooter Luigi Mangione, capitalism …

Extreme weather in 2025 drove record wildfire emissions in Europe

Extreme weather in 2025 drove record wildfire emissions in Europe

Published by skeptic

A firefighter battles the flames in Fundão, Portugal, in August 2025 DA SILVA/EPA/Shutterstock Europe suffered unprecedented wildfires and heatwaves in 2025, impacts that are expected to worsen on the world’s fastest-warming continent. Last year was the hottest year on record in the UK, Iceland and Norway and one of the three hottest years in Europe as a whole, according to an annual report by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). More than 95 per cent of the continent experienced above-average annual temperatures. Scandinavia, Finland and north-western Russia saw their worst-ever heatwave, 21 days of simmering temperatures that reached 30°C (86°F) even at the Arctic circle. This extreme heat probably stunted animal and plant growth while encouraging the spread of invasive species and pests, showing how the climate crisis is contributing to a crash in biodiversity, Celeste Saulo at the World Meteorological Organization said at a press conference. “This region would [typically] see zero to two days of strong heat stress, and we are speaking about 21, so this had a major impact on …