MOSCOW (RUSSIA) – Russian firefighters have been seeding clouds to prevent rain over wildfires raging in Siberia, the authorities said on Friday.
As of Friday, the Russian forestry agency said active work was being done to battle 158 forest fires covering 46,261 hectares. Just a few days ago, that area was more than three times larger.
The agency said firefighters were making use of planes to fire chemicals into the clouds above fires in northern, remote parts of the Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk regions of Siberia.
Humid climate and dry weather have led to the wildfires spread across the region and into the boreal forest and tundra that cover northern Russia.
Environmental group Greenpeace, which monitors the spread of wildfires in Russia, gave a confirmation that rain has helped to bring down fires in northern Siberia. However, other wildfires had appeared in the south near the big regional cities of Irkutsk and Krasnoyarsk.
Greenpeace said that 4.62 million hectares of forest had burned across Russia since the start of the year.
Emergency state has been announced in the regions of Krasnoyarsk and Yakutia, and in parts of several other Russian regions.
Scientists say they expect record-breaking temperatures in Siberia, which reached as high as 38 Celsius (more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit) last month, according to reports.
Copernicus, the EU’s earth observation programme, said that temperatures in Arctic Siberia had risen to a record average for June, which is more than 5 degrees Celsius (9°F) above normal.
(Photos syndicated via Reuters)
This story has been edited by BH staff and is published from a syndicated field.
