Fires that are raging in the Amazon rainforest are compounding the stress on the global climate and environment already unleashed by exceptional fires in the Arctic. There are also widespread fires in parts of tropical Africa.
Satellite imagery shows thousands of fires in Brazil, parts of Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay.
Using Copernicus Sentinel-3 data, as part of the Sentinel-3 World Fires Atlas, almost 4 000 fires were detected from 1 August to 24 August 2019, according to European Space Agency.
Scientists using NASA satellites to track fire activity also have confirmed an active – though not unprecedented – wildfire year in the Brazilian Amazon in 2019, according to a NASA Earth Observatory news article.
Fire activity in the Amazon varies considerably from year-to-year and month-to-month, and peaks during Brazil’s dry season from July to October. August 2019 has witnessed a noticeable increase in large, intense, and persistent fires burning along major roads in the central Brazilian Amazon, according to scientists at the Biospheric Sciences Laboratory at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
While drought has played a large role in exacerbating fires in the past, the timing and location of fire detections early in the 2019 dry season are more consistent with land clearing than with regional drought, according to NASA and ESA.
read more … World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
