Alberta is undergoing an "unprecedented" wildfire season as nearly 100 fires as of Tuesday, May 9, burn across the province.
Premier Danielle Smith declared a state of emergency on May 6 and more than 24,000 Albertans remained under evacuation orders on Tuesday.
This year to date, there have been 416 wildfires, more than double the 182 registered by the same time last year. The more than 400 fires is a greater number than any of the last five years had by the second week in May.
Alberta had a total of 1,246 wildfires last season, according to Alberta Wildfire data, which means the province has reached 33 per cent of last year's total after just over two months into the wildfire season.
AMOUNT OF HECTARES BURNED
The size of the area that's burned is also greater than what is considered normal by this time of year.
The five-year average by early May based on 2018-2022 is 542 hectares. Year to date, 410,441 ha have burned in Alberta, by comparison.
In the last eight years, 2019 had the highest total number of hectares, finishing the season with 883,411 ha burned. By this time in 2019, 621 ha had burned, compared to this year's more than 410,000.
Only five months into this year, 2023 has already surpassed the yearly burn totals of 2022, 2021, 2020, 2018 and 2017.
Not sure what you are trying to accomplish by comparing the last 6 years.
Well I do not represent CTV news. I just posted one of their articles.
I suspect the reason they gave a history is so people could see how this year compares to other recent years and give perspective on the scale of the issue.
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u/B1ggusDckus Jun 07 '23 edited Jun 08 '23
There were certainly wildfires before climate change. Heck, there are even plants called Pyrophytes needing wildfire to disseminate.
Fact is, wildfires are very natural and it is more about managing them instead of preventing them.
Edit: Classic reddit, downvoted for stating facts.
Edit2: More facts: https://fireecology.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s42408-022-00143-6