Amazon Wildfire: Parts of the Rainforest Are On Fire and Smoke Can Be Seen From Space
The Amazon rainforest has been burning for weeks amid increasing deforestation. The intense smoke was detected by NASA and plunged São Paulo into darkness on Monday.
Keep on reading horrible wildfire in pictures.
On Monday afternoon, the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil, went dark at 16:00 (20:00 GMT) as powerful winds carried the smoke from forest fires burning nearly 1,700 miles away, reported the BBC.
Source: AP
Almost 73,000 fires have been detected by Brazil’s space research center INPE, according to Reuters. It’s a record number this year, the agency said.
Source: AP
The smoke has traveled from the fires blazing in the Brazilian states of Rondônia and Amazonas and blackened the sky above the city for about an hour, the BBC added.
São Paulo, 3:30 PM #gothamcity pic.twitter.com/KyR1YOGg8q
— Leandro Mota (@leandromota_) August 19, 2019
“It was as if the day had turned into night,” resident Gianvitor Dias told the BBC. “Everyone here commented because even on rainy days it doesn’t usually get that dark. It was very impressive.”
Pontualmente 4h da noite em SP pic.twitter.com/07ZJdUeOM6
— Gianvitor Dias (@Gianvitor) August 19, 2019
Earlier this month, Amazonas (the largest state in Brazil) declared a state of emergency over the rising number of forest fires, reported Euro News. Fire season in the Amazon is just beginning—it runs from August through October, with its peak coming in mid-September, and the smoke is already so bad that it can be seen from space.
Source: AP
Last week, NASA released satellite images showing the patchwork of fires and smoke in Brazil. Citing the Global Fire Emissions Database, NASA noted that though current fire levels are slightly below average compared to the last 15 years, they are higher in some states, such as Amazonas and Rondônia.
Source: NASA
The fires blaze as the concern for the future of the Amazon is high. Since taking office in January, Brazil’s right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro has been accused of harming the Amazon rainforest and indigenous peoples in order to benefit loggers, miners and farmers who helped get him elected.
Source: AP
Bolsonaro, whose anti-environment rhetoric has included a pledge to end “Shiite ecologist activism,” has questioned the latest official figures showing deforestation increased 88% in June compared with the same period last year. He uses the word “Shiite” as a synonym for radicalism rather than denoting a branch of Islam.
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