Re: The unspoken truth about wildfires

On 8/1/2026 7:13 PM, dart200 wrote:
> On 8/1/26 5:30 PM, Dude wrote:
>> On 8/1/2026 10:23 AM, Noah Sombrero wrote:
>>> On Sat, 1 Aug 2026 18:04:46 +0100, Julian <[email protected]>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 30/07/2026 19:04, Julian wrote:
>>>>> Bordeaux and Madrid are threatened by flames. In Sicily, arsonists 
>>>>> tied
>>>>> burning rags to the tails of cats to spread fires. Here in Britain the
>>>>> Cairngorms and Peak District national parks are ablaze. It’s the 
>>>>> climate
>>>>> Armageddon, say the greens. If only we had built more wind farms and
>>>>> eaten fewer cows this would not be happening.
>>>>>
>>>>> Hot, dry spells undoubtedly make fires more likely, but awkwardly for
>>>>> those blaming climate change, wildfires are getting less frequent
>>>>> worldwide, not more, as the globe warms. The acreage burned has
>>>>> decreased steadily since 2000, according to Nasa’s satellites, and is
>>>>> thought to have almost halved in a century. The great fires of 1871 in
>>>>> Wisconsin and Michigan burned more than a million hectares long before
>>>>> anybody drove a car, before even Joseph Swan’s first light bulb, when
>>>>> the world was cooler.
>>>>>
>>>>> It is not just the trend that is surprising. Hard to believe, but this
>>>>> year is an unusually quiet year for wildfire: so quiet it is breaking
>>>>> records for lack of fires by this date, even in Europe. If you don’t
>>>>> believe me, check the figures produced by the Global Wildfire
>>>>> Information System: as of last week, the world had seen 106 million
>>>>> hectares burn this year, the lowest at this date since these records
>>>>> began in 2012. In Europe, just 3.6 million hectares have burned – less
>>>>> than half the average for this date. That’s cold comfort to people
>>>>> driven from their homes in France, but it is nonetheless a fact.
>>>>>
>>>>> The real issue is that climate change is a handy excuse for 
>>>>> politicians
>>>>> who have failed to take precautionary measures to prevent wildfires.
>>>>> They can just shrug: it’s global warming, innit? It has been known for
>>>>> many decades that in fire-prone habitats, the longer you go without a
>>>>> fire, the worse the fires will be. So preventing the build-up of 
>>>>> tinder
>>>>> by controlled burns is the most important factor.
>>>>>
>>>>> The California filmmaker Gabriel Mann’s hard-hitting 2023 documentary
>>>>> Hotshot showed in detail how fire suppression has made today’s fires
>>>>> harder to control. He has no patience with those who use climate 
>>>>> change
>>>>> as an alibi. ‘They tell you the sky is falling and it’s all the 
>>>>> fault of
>>>>> our modern, shitty climate,’ he says. ‘But when was the climate not
>>>>> shitty?’
>>>>>
>>>>> Here in Britain the government has consistently and relentlessly
>>>>> demanded less ‘cool’ burning – low-intensity, controlled fires – in
>>>>> winter on heather moorland, Britain’s most fire-prone habitat. Such
>>>>> fires have been used by farmers and gamekeepers for generations to
>>>>> create a mosaic of short and long heather. This encourages fresh young
>>>>> heather shoots for sheep and grouse to feed on and makes open areas 
>>>>> for
>>>>> rare birds such as golden plover and curlew to nest in. If done in
>>>>> winter it can burn off the rank heather plants while leaving the moss
>>>>> underneath barely touched, as demonstrated by a famous video in 
>>>>> which a
>>>>> gamekeeper places a Mars bar in the moss, lights a fierce fire over 
>>>>> it,
>>>>> then picks up the unscorched, unmelted chocolate bar, unwraps it and
>>>>> eats it.
>>>>>
>>>>> Natural England argues that regular cool burning harms the habitat;
>>>>> researchers at York University and elsewhere argue the opposite: 
>>>>> that it
>>>>> encourages the growth of sphagnum moss and other species by letting
>>>>> light in. But both sides agree that regular cool burns can 
>>>>> dramatically
>>>>> reduce the risk of much more damaging wildfires, which burn down 
>>>>> through
>>>>> the moss layer and into the peat. Cutting heather instead is less
>>>>> effective but better than nothing. Yet Natural England has banned
>>>>> heather burning on deep peat altogether and is pushing hard to 
>>>>> limit it
>>>>> further everywhere – or at least tie it up in complicated licensing
>>>>> rules. As a result, the fuel load on heather moorland has been
>>>>> increasing; in places the heather is now waist-deep. The National Fire
>>>>> Chiefs Council warned last year that such restrictions on heather
>>>>> management would increase ‘the danger to firefighters and the public’.
>>>>>
>>>>> Unlike private owners, bodies such as the Royal Society for the
>>>>> Protection of Birds (RSPB) and the National Trust are refusing to burn
>>>>> and reluctant to graze heather moorland, as they join the cult of
>>>>> ‘rewilding’. With the support of government, they plan to mitigate the
>>>>> fire risk by ‘rewetting’ moors with leaky dams to hold back rainwater.
>>>>> But this approach is useless in a drought.
>>>>>
>>>>> Case in point: the Tintwistle fire in the Peak District spread from a
>>>>> wild camp in woodland on to a heather moor owned by United 
>>>>> Utilities and
>>>>> managed by the RSPB. This moor had been extensively ‘rewetted’ yet it
>>>>> went up like a torch and the fire spread, drowned Manchester in smoke,
>>>>> burned deep into the peat and was only contained – for now – when 
>>>>> local
>>>>> gamekeepers and Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue used two diggers 
>>>>> and
>>>>> a bulldozer to create a firebreak on its northwest flank on the
>>>>> neighbouring Stalybridge estate. But so quick is Natural England to
>>>>> prosecute landowners and gamekeepers for even inadvertently breaking
>>>>> rules about managing habitat that they were anxious they might be
>>>>> punished for doing this.
>>>>>
>>>>> Richard Bailey, coordinator of the Peak District Moorland Group,
>>>>> estimates that the past month’s firefighting by gamekeepers would have
>>>>> cost the taxpayer millions of pounds if done by the fire service. Many
>>>>> long, hot, hard days and nights have left gamekeepers and their 
>>>>> families
>>>>> under severe mental strain, alleviated a little by generous food drops
>>>>> from Micklehurst cricket club. You can imagine how much it sticks 
>>>>> in the
>>>>> craw for these gamekeepers that they have been working to save land
>>>>> managed by an organisation that makes the risk worse.
>>>>>
>>>>> The nearby Dovestone fire was also started on RSPB-managed land 
>>>>> after a
>>>>> man drowned in the local reservoir and his friends commemorated him 
>>>>> with
>>>>> fireworks. The Cairngorms fire too began on land owned by the RSPB at
>>>>> Abernethy. The irony is not lost on locals that the very same 
>>>>> people who
>>>>> tell us that climate change is an existential crisis are also the ones
>>>>> urging us to stop using the one tool we know helps to mitigate the
>>>>> problem. If your view is that climate change is a massive threat, why
>>>>> are you pursuing policies that increase fuel load?
>>>>>
>>>>> The North York Moors fire last year affected 2,500 hectares of 
>>>>> moorland,
>>>>> smouldering for more than a month in the peat and releasing vast
>>>>> quantities of carbon dioxide. Yet no Defra minister bothered to visit.
>>>>> The cost of fighting these fires does not fall on their department, so
>>>>> why do they care, says Jamie Blackett, founder of Ground Cry, a new
>>>>> organisation campaigning on behalf of ground-nesting birds like 
>>>>> curlews.
>>>>>
>>>>> The authorities know their policies increase the fire risks. Here is
>>>>> what the Cairngorm National Park says in its Integrated Wildfire
>>>>> Management Plan about plans to increase shrubs and other vegetation by
>>>>> reducing deer and stopping burning: ‘These habitats will take many 
>>>>> years
>>>>> to develop and during the intervening period fuel loads will increase,
>>>>> as will the corresponding need for fire risk mitigation.’ So they knew
>>>>> the risk was increasing. But little was done. John Kirk, a board 
>>>>> member
>>>>> of the Cairngorms National Park Authority, told the Strathspey Herald:
>>>>> ‘Everyone is furious… the entire Abernethy forest has no firebreaks.’
>>>>>
>>>>> Andrew Gilruth, chief executive of the Moorland Association, says:
>>>>> ‘While Scotland has a clear plan to manage the excess vegetation, in
>>>>> England the authorities are obsessed with rewilding and restricting 
>>>>> all
>>>>> commonsense measures for reducing fuel loads.’
>>>>>
>>>>> In May, before the drought, Gilruth wrote to MPs who represent 
>>>>> moorland
>>>>> constituencies to point out that the number of firefighters is down 
>>>>> by a
>>>>> quarter over the past seven years and that the fire service relies
>>>>> heavily on gamekeepers’ vehicles, water bowsers and other equipment.
>>>>> Banning the burning of heather means fewer keepers can justify having
>>>>> such equipment. He described Defra’s refusal to change policy on 
>>>>> heather
>>>>> burning as reckless.
>>>>>
>>>>> Sadly he was proved right. So was I. After I warned in these very 
>>>>> pages
>>>>> last year that government policy was worsening the fire risk on
>>>>> moorland, it gives me no pleasure to say: ‘I told you so.’
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Matt Ridley
>>>>
>>>> The EU has failed to get a grip on Europe’s wildfires
>>>
>>> As if any old carpenter would know how to do that.  Stupid eu anyway.
>>>
>> Any old carpenter would know common sense.
>>
>> Human activity causes roughly 85% to 90% of all wildfires, with nature 
>> accounting for the remaining small fraction.
> 
> and despite that: lightning accounts for >50% acreage actually burned in 
> the us, and >90% in northern boreal forests like canada, which is why 
> the climate threat is still _very_ real
> 
> it's insane how committed to denial u people are
> 
> i don't even know why really, ur gunna be dead in decade or two, it's 
> not like ur gunna have to face the consequences either way 🤷 like what, 
> u want to go to grave feeling like u weren't the total retard???
> 
>   > welp, got bad news for u there dud ...
>   >
>   > #god
>
 >>
 >
Any old carpenter would know common sense.

Human activity and lightening causes roughly 85% to 90% of all 
wildfires, with nature accounting for the remaining small fraction.
 >


>>
>>>> Europe is burning. From France to Spain, from Portugal to Greece, and
>>>> even in Britain, the continent has been engulfed by flames this summer.
>>>> In France, more than 117,000 hectares have been lost to a succession of
>>>> wildfires and nearly a quarter of a million people have been evacuated.
>>>> It’s already been dubbed ‘the worst season of fire in history’.
>>>>
>>>> In Madrid, Paris and in other European capitals, politicians argue 
>>>> about
>>>> the fires – or rather the response to them. The lack of fire-fighting
>>>> aircraft in France, for example, has been seized on by opponents of
>>>> Emmanuel Macron’s government.
>>>>
>>>> Some of the media have focused on the human aspect: the fact that the
>>>> majority of the fires have been started by people, either inadvertently
>>>> or deliberately. Hundreds of arrests (predominantly young males) have
>>>> been made by European police forces and in France courts intend to take
>>>> ‘tougher criminal action’ to deal with fire-starters.
>>>>
>>>> But all this misses the crucial point, as Matt Ridley wrote in this
>>>> week’s magazine. Most of Europe has made a mess of its wildfire
>>>> management strategy this century. Ridley quoted Andrew Gilruth, chief
>>>> executive of the Moorland Association, who explained: ‘In England the
>>>> authorities are obsessed with rewilding and restricting all commonsense
>>>> measures for reducing fuel loads.’
>>>>
>>>> A lack of common sense has characterised Europe’s response to wildfires
>>>> in the 21st century. During the scorching summer of 2003, some 740,000
>>>> hectares were burnt and in response, the EU ‘set up an expert group to
>>>> advise on how to prevent and fight fires in Europe’.
>>>>
>>>> They published a report in early 2005, Forest Fires in Europe, 
>>>> declaring
>>>> that their ‘general principle is to restore nature and not to change 
>>>> the
>>>> landscape’. The report contained a great many statistics about forest
>>>> fires in EU member states and bemoaned ‘the lack of a common EU 
>>>> forestry
>>>> policy framework’. The report recognised the increased risk because of
>>>> ‘climate change and desertification’ but it didn’t offer coherent 
>>>> solutions.
>>>>
>>>> It took another 21 years before the EU finally unveiled its wildfire
>>>> strategy in March this year. It contained the usual Brussels waffle
>>>> about ‘holistic approaches’ and ‘stakeholders’. Roxana Mînzatu, the
>>>> Executive Vice-President for Social Rights and Skills, Quality Jobs and
>>>> Preparedness, declared:
>>>>
>>>> Europe must be ready before the first fire starts. That means 
>>>> building a
>>>> real culture of preparedness: equipping people with the right skills,
>>>> supporting firefighters and first responders, and helping communities
>>>> understand the risks they face.
>>>>
>>>> Underneath the trite soundbites, there was a recognition in the report
>>>> that Europe has allowed great areas of combustible vegetation to spread
>>>> throughout EU member states in recent decades. Abandoned farmland and
>>>> unmanaged forests, together with droughts and rising temperatures, have
>>>> created the conditions for a perfect firestorm.
>>>>
>>>> The report said that in order to prevent future wildfires, the EU must
>>>> pay ‘farmers and foresters to thin forests, graze livestock and restore
>>>> abandoned land’. It also recommended restoring peatlands, flood plains
>>>> and wetlands to retain moisture.
>>>>
>>>> This strategy will take years to implement effectively. And, crucially,
>>>> has the EU really got the will? At a meeting of agriculture 
>>>> ministers in
>>>> Brussels in May, Environment Conmissioner Jessika Roswall announced 
>>>> that
>>>> the Commission does ‘not plan any new initiatives on forest 
>>>> management’.
>>>>
>>>> The management of forests and land planning is also the preserve of
>>>> individual governments and the EU has struggled for a unified approach.
>>>> Brussels can recommend and encourage but it can’t force governments to
>>>> act. Sweden and Finland are the most resistant to EU interference on
>>>> forest management, while France also broadly believes the issue should
>>>> be one of national competence.
>>>>
>>>> Critics claim there is no competence. There was a huge wildfire in the
>>>> south-west of France in 2022, an area famous for its intensive maritime
>>>> pine monoculture. Many hectares of pine trees were lost. The response?
>>>> To replant thousands of pine trees in exactly the same layout.
>>>>
>>>> On Monday, Emmanuel Macron visited the Gironde department, in the
>>>> south-west of France, where more than 40,000 hectares have been lost to
>>>> flames this month. The president was confronted by the independent 
>>>> mayor
>>>> of one town affected by the fire.
>>>>
>>>> ‘We need a better-maintained, larger firebreak, even if it means losing
>>>> 1,000 or 2,000 hectares,’ said Bruno Lafon, the independent mayor of
>>>> Biganos and the head of the association for the protection of forests
>>>> against fire in his region.
>>>>
>>>> Lafon also took aim at politicians and environmentalists pontificating
>>>> in Paris. ‘We need to stop talking,’ he said, adding that the Paris
>>>> elite and the people whose homes are burning ‘no longer live in the 
>>>> same
>>>> world’.
>>>>
>>>> The same rings true of the Brussels elite. It’s time to stop talking 
>>>> and
>>>> take commonsense action.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Gavin Mortimer
>>
> 
>