Is global warming behind Greece’s wildfires?
By Paul Homewood
h/t Paul Kolk
Summer wouldn’t be complete without hordes of disgruntled British tourists being evacuated from their hotels, flown home early or spending their holidays sprawled on the floor of an international airport. But are the scenes of Rhodes really a symptom of a the world ‘being on fire’, as Greta Thunberg would put it?
Actually, in spite of scenes of burning forests on Rhodes and elsewhere being presented daily on our television screens, 2023 has not been a devastating year for forest fires in Europe. Data from the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), which covers the EU, shows that it has been an average year to date – with an early burst of fires in the spring followed by less activity since then.
It is a similar story with wildfires globally. A 2016 study published in a Royal Society journal using Nasa satellite data surprised many people by revealing that the amount of land burned annually in wildfires globally had decreased by about a quarter between 2001 and 2015. The authors have since updated their study and confirmed that in spite of increasing agonising over fires in the US, Europe and Australia, the amount of land being burned is still falling. This data includes all wildfires, not just forests – and globally 70 per cent of fires are on grassland rather than forests.
None of this is to say that climate change is not increasing the risk of fires in certain locations at certain times of year, but it does rather undermine lazy claims about the world being on fire. If anything, the world is being damped down.
We have been conditioned to think that climate change is the overwhelming problem facing human civilisation and all other life on Earth. But why is the extent of fires not actually increasing in the way that climate campaigners frequently claim? Partly because in some places shifting patterns of rainfall have reduced the risk of fire. But also because rising global temperatures are not the only influence on fires.
Why is the extent of fires not actually increasing in the way that climate campaigners frequently claim?
The incidence of wildfires also has a lot to do with land use. Where wildfires have increased in recent years, such as in some parts of Eastern Europe, it is down to farmland being abandoned and allowed to return to scrubland, which contains far more flammable material. Urban development close to forested areas also plays a big role, increasing the sources of ignition through barbecues, overhead electricity wires and so on.
Forest management also has a lot to do with it. Wildfires are, in many cases, natural events sparked off by lightning strikes – indeed, they play an essential role in many eco systems, with some plants taking advantage of fire in order to germinate. But in some parts of the Earth, especially the US, fire fighting authorities have become a little too good over the past century in fighting wildfires.
The incidence of fires in the US may have risen since the 1970s, but it is still a long way down on where it was a century ago. The result is that whereas in the past forests were regularly thinned out by fire, now dead wood is allowed to accumulate on the forest floor, meaning that when the forest does eventually catch fire you end up with a much bigger and less controllable fire. As Valerie Trouet, professor of dendrochronology (tree ring dating) puts it, the US is suffering from a ‘century of fire deficit’.
But how much easier to watch British holidaymakers fleeing from Rhodes with their suitcases, blame everything on climate change and claim the world is turning to ashes.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-global-warming-behind-greeces-wildfires/
The data below from the EU confirms that wildfire area has been declining since the 1980s:
https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/daviz/burnt-forest-area-in-five-4#tab-chart_5
And as we often find, the fires are started by arsonists:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/rhodes-wildfires-corfu-greece-arson-110146897.html
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
There is also the issue of failure to manage undergrowth for fire avoidance purposes, now highly unfashionable for various reasons, re-wilding is probably the dominant one.
Even the Guardian ran articles about previous mismanagement leading to more intense forest fires in America until 2017. Then Trump said this was the cause of fires in California and suddenly the Guardian changed their mind and blamed climate change.
Arson and simple carelessness with campfires and discarding cigarette butts. Certainly not “global warming” paranoia and hysterics
People never look in the right place for the true signs of change.
This is from the National Highway Safety Administration of the USA:
Fatalities per hundred million vehicle miles driven:
2010…………………..1.11
2015…………………..1.15
2019…………………..1.10
THEN!
2020………………….1.34
2021…………………..1.37
2022………………….1.35
Why would driving skills suffer a permanent decline? And what has happened with all the other skills which similarly involve cognition?
What actually starts the fires? What is the method of ignition, the first spark?
Would it be foolishly cynical of me to suggest it is people deliberately doing it? Is that why they seem to be in distributed patches?
Surely the police would easily catch people doing that – wouldn’t they?
It is obviously going much too far to suggest that bankrupt Greece is doing it deliberately to be able to plead for international compensation for “anthropic global warming” wrecking its economy? That would be absurd – wouldn’t it?
If the arsonists were in the UK, the police would probably escort them to and from the fire.
And supply them with matches!
And post selfies.
Here in Australia the threat of bushfires is getting worse. Nothing to do with Climate Change just the recent rain causing trees to grow, and the (in)action of bureaucrats banning fire breaks being kept clear, allowing undergrowth to spread and banning any removal of dead wood from forests.
There will be bad bushfires this coming year unless global cooling causes rain during summer. Without that rain expect hysteria from our ABC and not the BBC.
Do we have a legacy media that focuses on trivia and human interest stories as opposed to doing proper journalism? Holidaymakers minutes from being burnt to a crisp fleeing in their swimwear is much more appealing to them than any proper insight into wildfires.
As I’ve posted several times before, my very astute boss, in the 1970s) said of (particularly BBC) journalists “Know bugger all about anything, become a journalist!”
Autoignition temperature of wood is 600°C (1112°F) if heating by radiation and 490°C (914°F) if heating by conduction.
So it’s obviously back-radiation from increased amounts of anthroprogenic CO2 or someone holding a lighted match against wood tinder or lightning.
(In no particular order.)
I gather an activist calling himself Mr Swan Vestas was seen running away
With his mate Captain Webb
While stats about wildfires in Greece or in other parts of the Mediterranean Europe or even globally do not show anything catastrophic is going on. On the contrary. Nevertheless, it doesn’t stop the usual suspects from taking advantage of the situation.
And so, arson is now also part of The Great Climate Change and what’s remarkable, it was all predicted by climate scientists.
—
Petteri Taalas, Secretary General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), : The forest fires in Greece are a realized scenario of climate change
https://yle.fi/a/74-20042134/64-3-166582?utm_medium=social&utm_source=copy-link-share
Right down below the WUWT posts is a Global Temperature read out updated every minute from thousands and thousands of world wide thermometers. Variations from 30 year mean show practically no warming. The globe is currently at 14degreesC. Must rush upstairs and get my woolly..
I have posted this link before but it is a detailed anaylsis exactly about Grrek Wildfires. It was a 2002 masters thesis and doesn’t mention climate change at all.
Click to access maheras_georgios.pdf
I recall we’ve been here before, and Paul has pointed out the obvious – that wild fires are not all they seem.
First off – good maintenance of flammable areas is critical, whether we’re talking about major forest areas or (eg UK) heathlands. The Green Twerps have held back proper management if these areas, and must carry the blame.
Many of the areas with wildfires have had regular(ish) wildfires since year dot, so it’s nothing new.
The evidence on this? Look at a map of wildfires on the West coast of America. Wildfires are a regular occurrence in California, Oregon and Washington State. Unsurprisingly, urban construction has encroached on the forest areas – “we want to live close to nature”. Also, brash (dead material) is not managed (ie removed). Ostensibly (unsensibly!) this is to encourage the wildlife. In fact, the opposite happens – few animals can escape a wildfire covering many square miles – most will die.
Needless to say, the (expletive deleted) culprits DON’T believe they have contributed to the mayhem. But they are 99% the cause.
As for the evidence – I recall Paul having shown a chart of wildfires right up the 2 states and into Canada. The wildfires miraculously stop at the US-Canada border. This is because the Canadian forestry commission manage things in a proper manner. I suspect it’s probably because the smaller population in the part of Canada (well, it can be cold up there) exerts less in the way of stupid pressures.
At least we have a relatively mainstream publication with a more reasoned article – makes a change!
On the BBC Radio 4 Today program yesterday morning, 24th July at just after 9:00 am the news presenter questioned the deputy mayor of the Greek island of Corfu about the cause of the fires. The reply from the deputy mayor was very clear. He said he had a meeting with the chief of the fire department and it was a deliberate act by a group of maniacs who had already started fires a week earlier and they were expecting them to do it again. He said that “the maniacs get pleasure out of seeing people suffer”. So arson was clearly the cause of the fires according to the authorities”.
The BBC must have been upset that he had not helped their own agenda to link everything to climate change as they couldnt bring themselves to repeat the clear message that it was arson because on a subsequent news report yesterday afternoon they downgraded the definitive answer to “may be deliberate”.
The question which should now be put to the BBC is;
Why did the BBC feel it necessary to misquote the clear answer given for the cause of the fires other than to promote their own climate change misinformation agenda?
I played the BBC News from 9-00 to 9-03 for yesterday 24th July and couldn’t find the clip about arsonists – to my disappointment!
Can you check the timing etc. please?
Sure, Its BBC Today program which runs from 06:00hrs in the mornings and if you run the sound sequence it starts at around 2:45 on the time slider.
Here is the link:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001p1kp
Thank you – I listened with interest and noticed that the interviewer didn’t even comment on the deputy mayor’s claims of the maniacs’ arson.
Any thoughts? As the years go by and trees get taller, forest fires by whatever means of ignition are going to be more intense.
About 35 years ago we took a holiday in Thassos, a Greek island, which had experienced a really big fire which had devastated much of the island the year before. There was no mention then of the climate causing the fire. The following year we witnessed a fire in Crete. It wasn’t huge but it covered a hillside. The Greeks seemed fairly unconcerned and blamed it on a farmer making a mistake.Fires in Greece seem pretty regular. This one on Rhodes seems big but I’m sure it wasn’t the first and certainly won’t be the last. It’s something the Greeks have always lived with much like the Americans, Australians and even us to a lesser extent.
Recently stayed a couple of weeks in the Costa del Sol, South Spain. A collection of expensive residences were being built on a ridge covered in a two metre depth of dead and dry plants. Those swanky houses had great views of the Med but all were surrounded by uneven hillocks with a forest of combustible scrub.
One day the owners will have to escape their very own angry forest fire – and they too will blame it on Climate Change!
Its the same in the mountains at the back of Malibu in California. Some of the owners have taken heed of the warnings of a fire there a couple of years back and have tried to clear the ground around them. I’ll see how they are getting on this winter when I visit the area. Generally the area is covered in scrub with small woods and nobody has thought to clear the dead stuff. Its a disaster waiting to happen especially as there are overhead electricity cables which have sparked in the past and, apart from careless/idiotic campers etc, are the main cause of fires there.
Strewth, just when you thought the likes of the BBC and the Grauniad could not get any worse, we have Damian (Prophet of DoooooooM) Carrington posting even more crap than any sewage authority ever had to deal with.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jul/25/gulf-stream-could-collapse-as-early-as-2025-study-suggests
The Gultstream is possibly going to “COLLAPSE” in less than 18months time!
This is getting beyond pathetic. Who the F@ck does this moron think he is?
Are there no satirical TV progs left that should be taking the piss out of all this?
Who pays for this guy to post such bollocks?
The ‘made more likely’ squad chimes in…
https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/extreme-heat-in-north-america-europe-and-china-in-july-2023-made-much-more-likely-by-climate-change/
If I recollect correctly, they were saying the same thing about the Gulf Stream 20 or 30 years ago. They even got experts to say so.
Yes. I have heard it will collapse soon,over and over again. for years now. It used to alternate with sightings of flying saucers when there was space to fill in newspapers
Like Bigfoot. What happened to that creature?
The ultimate “push” for the Gulf Stream, issuing from the Gulf of Mexico, comes from the Trade Winds blowing water INTO the cul-de-sac that is the Gulf of Mexico.
To believe that a smidgin of global warming will change the Hadley cells in the atmosphere that the Sun causes* and abolish the Trade Winds is beyond stupid.
The Gulf Stream is complicated, and individual strands and currents appear and disappear all the time.
There is no such thing as a “Gulfstream collapse”. It’s complete garbage.
The physics associated with different densities and temperatures together with coriolis in any large body of water will always drive a thermohaline process. It can’t be stopped or “collapsed” as idiots suggest. It’s a bit like saying air will stop moving or the wind will stop blowing!! Ocean currents either strengthen or weaken at times depending on a complicated multitude of combined factors. Its complex, very complex, and little has been understood to date. I personally believe that there is one other driving force which hasn’t even popped up on the radar yet. This being magma weather, and how changing magma iron density just beneath the Earth’s crust could be playing a crucial role in long term regional ocean heat transfer due to variable electromagnetic field propagation. This could be significant which would be continuously altering global atmospheric precipitation paterns, humidity and therefore surface insolation distribution over the long term all over the planet.