Wildfires are getting longer, fiercer, and more costly to contain. Wildfires have burned an average of 7 million U.S. acres every year since 2000. That’s equal to burning all of Yellowstone National Park three times over each year. But from 1960 to 1999, wildfires consumed half that amount – an average 3.5 million acres a year. U.S. wildfire seasons now last an average 76 days longer than in the 1970s and 1980s. Before 1986, a wildfire was contained on average in less than eight days. Since then, the average wildfire has burned for 37 days.
Face the Facts USA: Wildfires are burning longer – San Jose Mercury News
The five largest fires in US history all occurred more than a century ago.
- 1871 Peshtigo Fire – 3.8 million acres
- 1825 Maine Fire – 3 million acres
- 1898 South Carolina – 3 million acres
- 1910 Idaho – 3 million acres
- 1881 Michigan – 2.5 million acres
By cherry picking the ice age scare of the 1960s and 1970s to compare against, there is no limit to how much climate BS can be generated.
h/t to Marc Morano
“The most widespread and severe drought conditions occurred in the 1930s and 1950s (Andreadis et al., 2005). The early 2000s were also characterized by severe droughts in some areas, notably in the western United States. When averaged across the entire United States (Figure 2.6), there is no clear tendency for a trend based on the PDSI. Similarly, long-term trends (1925-2003) of hydrologic droughts based on model derived soil moisture and runoff show that droughts have, for the most part, become shorter, less frequent, and cover a smaller portion of the U. S. over the last century (Andreadis and Lettenmaier, 2006). The main exception is the Southwest and parts of the interior of the West, where increased temperature has led to rising drought trends (Groisman et al., 2004; Andreadis and Lettenmaier, 2006). The trends averaged over all of North America since 1950 (Figure 2.6) are similar to U.S. trends for the same period, indicating no overall trend.”
– U.S. Climate Change Science Program
Synthesis and Assessment Product 3.3
“There is not enough evidence at present to suggest high confidence in observed trends in dryness due to lack of direct observations, some geographical inconsistencies in the trends, and some dependencies of inferred trends on the index choice. There is medium confidence that since the 1950s some regions of the world have experienced more intense and longer droughts (e.g., southern Europe, west Africa) but also opposite trends exist in other regions (e.g., central North America, northwestern Australia).”
-SPECIAL REPORT OF THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE
http://www.ipcc-wg2.gov/SREX/images/uploads/SREX-All_FINAL.pdf
Any semi-hysterical alarmist report of this nature should be assumed a fraud until otherwise proven.
Dear hyperbolists,
The US covers 3,794,083 square miles. That is equal to 2,428,213,120 acres. Assume for hilarity that 7,000,000 acres burned every year and never ever grew back. It would take nearly 347 years to burn the country.
Why do these trees have to grow back so quickly and dampen your disaster?
Resume abnormal panic…