[reco98gg]

The main reason the forest is burning is global warming. There were 3 punishing heatwaves before the fire, it was just a matter of time.

A part of the Fontainebleau forest, much more north, no pine trees, went in smoke earlier. Forests are burning near Madrid.

It may make some people feel better to think that it is an isolated, local problem, but unfortunately global warming is the main culprit and we at least need to acknowledge it.

Article explaining when pine tree forest resist well or not to fire. https://www.sudouest.fr/faits-divers/incendies/incendies-en-...

[superfrank]

I don't think the person you're responding to was trying to deny global warming being a factor. I think they're just explaining why this fire is so bad compared to other fires we have seen in France before.

I know global warming plays a major role in this, but I still found it interesting to know why this fire seems so bad.

[reco98gg]

You may be absolutely right about the OP, I cannot know.

Still, I believe it is important to highlight the elephant in the room first.

For example to your point: "I still found it interesting to kmow why this fire seems so bad compared to [...] before", I think it is important to state: "because global warming is getting worse over time". Not because pine trees, which have been around for a long time, and have never burned so badly.

[mytailorisrich]

The elephant in the room is that many of those fires are criminal and that the French government has arbitrated budget restrictions against investing in fire-fighting equipment, especially planes.

It so happens that the current fire near Bordeaux is roughy in the same area as the historic fire of 1949 in which 82 people died (and currently still smaller, hopefully it will stay that way) [1], as someone else already mentioned.

Wildfires in Fontainebleau are not new, either, even if this year's one it is historically large. First laws against fires in the in forest and obligation of inhabitants to help in case of fire date from the 14th century [2].

Yes warming trends do not help and increase risk (hence need to invest in equipment and prevention) but there is also fabricated drama and lack of perspective, which are unfortunately how everything is reported nowadays.

[1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incendie_de_1949_dans_la_for%C...

[2] https://www.fontainebleau-photo.fr/2013/08/les-incendies-de-...

[evomassiny]

About a third of those fires are criminal [0], yes that's a lot, but the majority are still accidental or natural.

Even the criminal ones are only enabled because of the dry vegetation, caused by the recent heat waves. IMO focusing on what caused the spark is missing the root cause: global warming.

And yes you can argue that such fires existed previously, but what's concerning is that the frequency on which they are happening is increasing rapidly

[0]https://observatoire.foret.gouv.fr/themes/les-causes-des-inc...

[mytailorisrich]

In the South of France, dry vegetation in summer is normal. Areas where this is most expected, the Mediterranean, have actually seen a decrease of fires over time as preventive measures and fire-fighting readiness have increased. [1] See graph for "Nombre de feux de foret in zone mediterraneene 1973-2024", graph for "surfaces parcourues", and text.

That's why I am suggesting to keep a cool head and to take a step back to analyse things rationally. In any case that is good advice to adapt to warming, too. If you go down the rabbit hole of media reporting you are going to have a nervous breakdown.

[1] https://observatoire.foret.gouv.fr/themes/l-historique-des-f...

[Loquebantur]

A rational approach to existential threats is indeed good advice, but to surrender in the face of complexity is not.

The human induced climate catastrophe is due to a systemic failure and consequentially needs to be addressed on a systemic level. The economic system and policies need to be adapted, even against the implied subjective interests of the biggest holders of capital and assets.

They like to paint that as "impossible", but of course it's not.

[Arodex]

>warming trends do not help

Understatement of the year, here, after the third heatwave of the year with a fourth on the way and record after record being shattered.

>(hence need to invest in equipment)

Easy.

>fabricated drama and lack of perspective

The one with a lack of perspective is not the ones you think.

[yoghurtwere]

> Not because pine trees, which have been around for a long time, and have never burned so badly.

Are you sure?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1949_Landes_forest_fire

[reco98gg]

I responded to this elsewhere on this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065156

Basically they had no way to fight those fires at the time, as the article explains.

[reco98gg]

[Answering here to @applepearlime bc limits of my green acct]

They do have firebreaks, paths for trucks to go in many places [1]. I've seen many.

But you could argue they're not wide enough to actually break fire. And when I see videos of how tall and wide the flames are, I have no idea how wide they should be... It's a managed forest though, definitely looked after because economics interests (wood, tourism).

[1] https://cnes.fr/geoimage/aquitaine-littoral-landais-massif-f...

[bigfatkitten]

> And when I see videos of how tall and wide the flames are, I have no idea how wide they should be...

Up to 40km, depending on the wind. Embers can travel a long way.

[applepearlime]

I can't say that I buy your argument.

Either way, firebreaks and green firebreaks seem like they could be a reasonable mitigation approach, whatever the overall causes.

Does anyone here know whether the Landes forest has good firebreaks? If not, does anyone here know why? I failed to find anything about it online.

[gabaix]

I grew up there. I used to bike along stretches of firebreaks between plots. These firebreaks are nowhere nearly enough. Trees are young, pine needles spread everywhere, and ground is sandy.

The forest is a giant tinderbox.

[Arodex]

You know this was once, 77 years ago?

[OJFord]

And global warming reached a critical point of worseness specifically in Landes & Médoc?

[Loquebantur]

The human induced climate catastrophe has reached unprecedented levels because of humanity's continued failure to correctly integrate that reality into their decisions and the resulting inaction.

Landes & Médoc serve as an immediate example of the consequences of that catastrophe being left to unfold unabated.

Using diminutive terms to describe causalities that currently escalate beyond human control and ultimately lead to civilizational collapse with billions of deaths is a dysfunctional disconnect from reality.

[OJFord]

You misunderstand. Dibby053 provided interesting context for why specifically that region is so badly affected right now, on a background of global climate catastrophe. Rico98gg is derailing what could have been a more interesting thread with 'no, it's global warming', which is obvious and irrelevant.

[anthonyrstevens]

It's you that is (intentionally?) missing the forest for the trees (wordplay intentional). The overall pattern of worsening fires is clear and well-documented, and disingenously asking "Why Landes & Medoc specifically?" ignores the broader issue.

[markdown]

The pine forests have been there for centuries, so it being pine is no explanation at all for why it's burning so badly now.

[tirant]

I come from the Mediterranean region and locally we know many explanations for that.

Many of those pine forests are relatively new. Pine trees burn frequently, around every 20-30 years. In the past they used to be mixed with many other original trees, but during the recent century reforestation, pines were planted as the single tree species, making fires more prone to happen and more easily to spread.

In the past, way more population lived next to the forests, where lumber used to be part of their income, so trees were frequently cut, forests maintained and shepherds would bring their sheep to feed from forest lower plants. All of that is gone.

In the past, locals used to be able to build firewalls, clean forests and fight fire with fire (provoking small controlled wildfires to stop the big ones). Green policies forbid those actions nowadays.

Also, if we talk about past centuries, temperatures used to be higher during early middle age and before. These high temperatures are nothing new in terms of historical forest.

Also, looking at the statistics, we’re probably at the bottom number of wildfires per area in the last 70-80 years, while total forest mass has probably increased around 40-50%.

[tsimionescu]

> Also, if we talk about past centuries, temperatures used to be higher during early middle age and before. These high temperatures are nothing new in terms of historical forest.

This was the hottest year on record. 10 of the last 15 years have been the hottest year on record, consecutively. What makes you believe this fake information about the middle ages?

[tmtvl]

Someone heard about the Medieval Warm Period, looked at the Wikipedia page, saw the temperature data for the Greenland ice sheets and misinterpreted it to mean global temperature. It fits in well with the 'well, the Jurassic was warmer than today and there were no humans then, so you can't be sure that we're responsible for any climate change that may be happening' argument.

[jcattle]

None of what you are writing is applicable to Landes. Outside of scandinavia Landes region is some of the most intensely managed forest in Europe.

From planting to cutting is only around 30-50 years. With multiple thinnings in between. Also none of that forest existed 200 years ago and there never was anything other than pine planted there for those 200 years, in the beginning for resin, now for pulp.

And so none of it burned in the middle ages or was affected by any higher temperatures because it didn't exist back then.

[arboles]

It does seem that the area burnt p/year by wildfires hasn't grown in the last 40 years in Europe, and even decreased slightly. This is somewhat odd to me. The evacuation and disruption of settlements seems to have increased in severity in the last few years, or at least the media gives that perception. If I'm looking at the wrong data and this could be misleading, then apologies.

The chart I'm looking at (1980-2020):

- https://www.eea.europa.eu/en/analysis/maps-and-charts/burnt-...

This one starts in the 00s but goes to 2024, and also shows a decrease:

- https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-area-burnt-by-wild...

Do you have the data that goes as far back as 80 years ago though?

[mctaylor]

I love how four comments down there is someone posting:

"You’re both right. However OPs post is more useful than yours.

By now, everyone knows about climate change. But I assume most didn’t know the fact about the pine trees in this area.

Nowadays it’s much more about how we deal with climate change and not so much about the fact that there is human made climate change"

Thank you for proving that there are, in fact, still climate change deniers even here on hacker news.

I'm assuming you're a climate change denier. You don't say so outright, but "Green policies forbid those actions nowadays" is a bit of a dogwhistle that you oppose environmental protection regulations broadly (not merely overzealous ones that have side-effects that make combating certain types of wildfires harder in certain situations), and:

"Also, if we talk about past centuries, temperatures used to be higher during early middle age and before. These high temperatures are nothing new in terms of historical forest.

Also, looking at the statistics, we’re probably at the bottom number of wildfires per area in the last 70-80 years, while total forest mass has probably increased around 40-50%."

Well... that's pretty close to just coming out and saying you don't believe in climate science.

This truly is the least intelligent timeline.

[bluebarbet]

These factual corrections are warranted. But IMO the accusations of dog-whistling and wrongthink are unnecessary and counterproductive. Again: I agree with you on the substance! And this probably is a climate denier. But (1) that's not very interesting in itself, and (2) by adopting an accusatory tone we're just going to push them and their sympathizers into a posture of defensiveness and victimhood which will only worsen the polarization and make the whole problem even harder to solve than it already is. IMO, on this issue it's best just to stick doggedly to factual correction and avoid the temptation to police people's inner minds.

[cassepipe]

On the one hand I agree with you, on the other hand I think this is highly idealistic: Most people would have a hard time debating a flat-earther since it's their hobby and they master all the talking points whereas you spent maximum one hour even thinking about it in the last 10 years. They will get you in a dark forest of details you don't know how to navigate and win the argument.

I am so sorry for the one in a million crackpot-sounding genius that will get hurt in the process but social shunning is just so so much more effective. No wonder the crackpots and grifters are back and running the show nowadays

I think a better approach is to ask people who have contrarian/non-consensual opinions to show that they know that they are crackpots out and to distance themselves from them:

"I know some people come up with conspiracy theories that says climate is a hoax designed to control populations because they don't want to change anything in their way of life but that's not what I am. I just care about the science and I think I found a real flaw in the leading explanation of climate change. I'd love for someone with knowledge about to discuss it with me to see if they took X into account" etc.

This above is what I expect but if you quack like a quack, you're probably a quack and you'll get the social shunning treatment

[dzink]

The dark ages and the plague saw a lot of belief in religion and rejection of science that lead to excessive deaths all over europe. Medicine was studied and practiced in the arab world and jewish doctors were the only ones allowed to bring some of those practices to Europe. Religion was preventing tested and verified approaches to treatment. Today Europe needs to stop repeating that practice. Believing in human caused climate change doesn’t stop you from learning proper tested mitigation strategies against wildfires, cooling of people in cities, nuclear energy or anything else that allows you to mitigate the effects of your climate religion. Because you can mitigate death in your area way before you can stop china or any other high emitter from emitting CO2 on the other side of the planet from you and contributing to global warming.

[Loquebantur]

There is no dichotomy between preparing for the inevitable and preventing the preventable.

Painting the actions of people on the other side of the planet as "out of anybody's control" is hubris though. Humanity very well is capable of organizing on that scale and has done so regularly for a long time already.

The actual problem is the disconnect between the interests of those in charge of such organization and the well-being of the public.

[phikappa]

"but "Green policies forbid those actions nowadays" is a bit of a dogwhistle that you oppose environmental protection regulations broadly (not merely overzealous ones that have side-effects that make combating certain types of wildfires harder in certain situations)"

thats a bit of a "dogwhistle" that you're not actually convinced that green policies can ever be deranged and counterproductive. On the contrary. I don't know if you're a a brainwashed virtue signaler, but I'm assuming it. You don't say so outright, but the mental gymnastics of calling someone a climate changer denier who just said climate change is widely recognised are staggering.

This truly is the least intelligent timeline. Please check with Dunning and Kruger if you're part of the problem.

[AlecSchueler]

They've actually been there for less than two centuries, just to be pedantic.

[superfrank]

It's not, but the original comment never claimed that it was.

There have been 4 or 5 pretty massive wildfires in France that I can remember in the last 5 years, but this is the first time they've had to deal with pyrocumulonimbus caused by a wildfire. Global warming was likely a contributing factor for all of those fires, but global warming alone doesn't explain why this one is different. The first comment about the pine isn't answering "why is this happening now?", it answers the question, "why is this fire so much worse?"

[sandworm101]

Decades ago i was a big wall rock climber. We would often see old photos of mountains and cliffs and remark "where are the trees?" Areas we knew to be covered in forrest were bare only a century ago. This wasnt logging (climbing areas are too rugged to be logged bare.) There were just fewer trees. The general assumption was CO2. The combination of longer growing seasons and more plant food (co2) may mean there are simply more trees.

[Earw0rm]

The timing is curious to me. Atmospheric CO2 didn't really start picking up bigtime until 1970, and trees, even fast growing pines, take decades to grow.

[applepearlime]

But one pine forest in France has burned badly in the past as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1949_Landes_forest_fire

Did you check for forest fires in the past?

[baxtr]

You’re both right.

However OPs post is more useful than yours.

By now, everyone knows about climate change. But I assume most didn’t know the fact about the pine trees in this area.

Nowadays it’s much more about how we deal with climate change and not so much about the fact that there is human made climate change.

[Kon5ole]

>By now, everyone knows about climate change. But I assume most didn’t know the fact about the pine trees in this area.

>Nowadays it’s much more about how we deal with climate change and not so much about the fact that there is human made climate change.

Well said!

The problem isn't who believes in global warming, the problem is a forest fire. It doesn't care if there are 0% or 100% believers. Moving the needle on that percentage has no effect on the problems we will face due to global warming.

Here and now it's possible for a small community or country to take actions that will help the next time there's a forest fire. Or a flood, or a drought, or a heat dome, or a blizzard where blizzards shouldn't be.

Such efforts should clearly be priority 1. A doctor dealing with a gunshot wound doesn't start by urging politicians to reduce crime rates, they start by stopping the bleeding.

[watwut]

> By now, everyone knows about climate change.

Not true, I have seen people deny it on HN recently.

And looking at other debates, yes it is necessary to reiterate the primary cause. Because centrists will absolutely use the lack of that reiteration to do the "well actually it is the pine trees" in two days.

[Orphis]

It's not a single source problem anyway. There are many contributing factors, some are probably more important than others.

The most important thing is knowing what can be done in the short to medium term locally to improve the situation. If you tell the people living near those forests they need to fix global warming, you're not going anywhere. Can they monitor the forest beds better, do some preventive measures to limit the propagation of fires when they happen? Probably!

Unless you're on a major international forum or you have proper global reach and are a trendsetter, complaining about the obvious global warming isn't going to do much. And even if it's not obvious to some other people, you're not going to change their mind anyway on a HN discussion.

[baxtr]

For me, it is more important to fight for human lives than fighting centrists or deniers tbh. You have to pick your battles.

[pepperoni_pizza]

It is centrists and deniers who are stopping us in implementing effective measures that would fight for human lives.

[baxtr]

You will not convince them by saying things over and over again. It’s not like they haven’t heard the facts. It might have even have the opposite effect, increasing their unwillingness to believe it’s more than just a hoax.

Ask yourself: when was the last time vigorous repetition of a position has convinced you personally?

You will convince them by showing them how to do it properly. Show them the way and they might follow.

[Loquebantur]

You're very wrong.

The propaganda practice of incessant repetition being effective even in face of blatantly obvious contradicting facts is well established.

The reason climate catastrophe deniers incessantly repeat their nonsense isn't because they like to hear themselves talk, it's because it works.

The majority of people are never convinced by rational arguments or facts, they act solely on subjectively perceived personal outcomes. Facing social opposition and loss of face very well can sway them.

[watwut]

Vigorous repetition of position when you are facing opposition that vigorously repeats their position ... is the only option.

What you suggest leads to a word where only deniers tall, thus only their side is heard and thus they win. And yes, I was convinced by people I heard talking. I was never convinced by people who said nothing.

[hdgvhicv]

Some people will deny water is wet. Reiterating

“Centrists” (whatever that means) aren’t denying climate change.

Even if 99% of America accepts climate change that’s still 350,000 that don’t, and there’s a good chance many deniers are just doing it for the lolz.

The world was unwilling to enact the changes that were required. The mitigations of the damage to both the human and natural world are required now, and there’s lots of discussion about that. Not least what happens when a nuclear power of 1.5 billion people reaches a wet bulb temperature high enough to start killing tens of millions.

[Arodex]

"Aktchually, forests burn because wood is flammable" is not the "useful" fact you think it is.

Yes, pine is flammable. So what? Should we replace it with wood that doesn't burn? And grows on already very dry soil? Because what the "informative" OP hasn't told you is that pine growsso much there because other woods don't do as well.

[throw0101d]

> Yes, pine is flammable. So what? Should we replace it with wood that doesn't burn?

Different trees react differently to fire. The forest fires of (e.g.) the American west are different than the forest fires in Canada:

> The forest-mismanagement argument was, in fairness, based on real evidence from some regions. In the frequent-fire dry forests of the western US that are dominated by ponderosa pine and mixed conifers the natural fire regime is low-to-moderate intensity surface fire returning every 5 to 30 years, historically stoked in part by Indigenous burning. A century of fire exclusion in those forests really did remove that frequent fire, let stands grow denser and more continuous, and build up a “fire deficit” that raises the odds of severe fire (Hagmann et al. 2021). And in that setting, fuel treatments work: Prichard et al. (2021) find wide agreement that mechanical thinning combined with prescribed burning measurably reduces subsequent fire severity. If you’re arguing about the Sierra Nevada, the management story is as important if not more important than the climate one.

> The problem is that the Canadian boreal is not the Sierra Nevada. It burns in infrequent, high-intensity, stand-replacing crown fires that kill the whole stand on natural fire cycles measured in many decades to centuries (commonly a century or more, and two centuries or longer in the east), not 5 to 30 years. It is, ecologically speaking, supposed to burn this way; black spruce is practically built for it. Fire in this system was never the gentle recurring ground-clearing that suppression interrupted in California. And the burning is astonishingly concentrated: across the boreal, something like 3% of fires account for about 97% of the area burned. This is not a landscape full of many small fires that “used to clean out the fuel.” Rather, its a landscape that waits, and then burns catastrophically under extreme weather.

* https://www.theclimatebrink.com/p/canadas-boreal-wildfires-a...

> And grows on already very dry soil? Because what the "informative" OP hasn't told you is that pine growsso much there because other woods don't do as well.

Except the entire forest is 'artificial' in that Napoleon III ordered the draining of the peatlands to create said forest in the first place. Perhaps actually having it as a forest should be reconsidered.

* https://globalpeatlands.org/zombiefiresareravagingpeatlandsi...

The forest was created for industrial purposes and so pine was probably chosen as it grew faster and that's what builders wanted, but is that what want we now? Perhaps the fact that pine grows best there shouldn't be considered at such a high priority, and that reducing the mono-culture, even if it is not "optimal" for growth, be bumped up in priority.

[Arodex]

And you think the peatlands were natural? In France, in 1857, a stone's throw from Bordeaux?

It was already a huge product of human activity: the forest there was cut for firewood, great colds killed the rest in the XVIIe century and grazing sheeps kept it treeless. Pine was chosen because it is endemic and one of the few species able to grow on such poor soils, washed out by rain and sea salt.

You have to love all the people on this website giving advice on Europeans and Canadians on forest management, and that they should abandon any economic use of forests, while they see no problem with the rest of their economic choices fuelling global warming.

[throw0101d]

> And you think the peatlands were natural? In France, in 1857, a stone's throw from Bordeaux?

If it is indeed a question between "artificially forest" or "artificially peat", then pick what's most useful to humans at the moment: how much lumber is needed? Is resin tapping still important? How much more utility is that compared to having to deal with wildfires that seem to regularly rip through the area over the decades:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1949_Landes_forest_fire

Does 100% of what is now forest 'have' to stay that way? Or 80%? 50?

> You have to love all the people on this website giving advice on Europeans and Canadians on forest management

1. I am Canadian.

2. The French themselves have considered doing something else besides the forest that is currently there:

* https://www.lemonde.fr/en/opinion/article/2022/08/16/mps-sho...

* https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S02648...

[tirant]

Blaming everything on global warming is extremely dangerous. It fails to address many other reasons why we are experiencing fires and creates an easy to blame enemy and a sensation that there's nothing we can do.

We should really go way deeper than just blaming everything on an increase of temperatures, which nevertheless is actually happening.

We, locals, have been warning already for decades of the increase of fires due to an accumulation of reasons, which I have actually described already in another message down below but I can summarize here.

* Forest mass has actually increased a lot during the last decades, Spain has now around 50% more forest mass than in the 1970s.

* Part of the increased mass has to do with reforestation efforts done by governments happening since last half of last century, which basically planted many forests using pine varieties which grow very quickly but also burn quickly (Pines are biologically design to burn with their flammable design and dried needles, that's their feature).

* Historical local forest were composed of many varieties of trees, including oaks, holm oaks, poplar, which grow slowly, are way less prone to burn, and regrow again after a fire. Those varieties were never used in any reforestation efforts, which has resulted in many new forests being extremely prone to burn quickly

* Population has shifted enormously towards big cities, abandoning little villages where forests were part of their style of life. Lumber was part of their economical income, which resulted in continuous care of those forests and efforts in preservation. There are still some communities like that in some areas of Spain, and their forests have the lowest rate of wildfires in the whole country.

* Many techniques like firebreaks, counter-fires, low intensity burning to clear crop stubble, dry brush, and old vegetation to regenerate fresh grass for livestock and prepare fields are now forbidden, again increasing the risk and extension of wildfires

* Forest Grazing is also nowadays completely forbidden. Sheep used to roam everywhere in the country, consuming many burning-prone vegetation, reducing also the risk of wildfires.

But even despite all of that, countries like Spain for example, have nowadays the lowest proportion of burnt forest since the last 50 years.

[palata]

> Blaming everything on global warming is extremely dangerous

I don't think it's blaming on global warming. Global warming is just making those problems a lot worse.

It is just the beginning, on average it will get worse every year. Every kilogram of CO2 we emit makes it worse, so it won't stop worsening until we reach zero emissions.

> a sensation that there's nothing we can do.

On the contrary, I think there too much we must do because of global warming. There is so much that we certainly won't be able to do it all, meaning that the situation will get "more complicated" anyway. The more we do, the more we preserve.

To make a comparison that stays in the theme: saying "we won't stop it so there is nothing we can do" is like saying "this burning tree is dead anyway, so there is no need to save the rest of the forest". The tree is dead, it won't come back. And we know for sure that many other trees will die. But we should fight to preserve as much as we can from the forest. The less we do, the more we lose. But we will lose a lot anyway, maybe just not everything (depending on how well we fight).

[netol]

Hola!

While I think this is mostly correct, I don't think it's OK to downplay climate change as just a "blame target". These current and extreme wildfires result from hotter and drier conditions, too. That is a major reason. And yes, we can do something about it.

Also, I know that controlled burns, grazing and firebreaks are widely used today in Spain, they are not universally forbidden.

[Earw0rm]

Sheep and slow growing trees of course don't get along well, you have to choose one or the other at least while the trees establish, which for oaks is measured in decades.

In Wales and Ireland we have the opposite problem, the sheep strip everything bare, the old trees die and the forests cannot regenerate.

[pvaldes]

> The problem is that species that grow slow are not being used and they would be less flammable

> The problem is that sheep are not allowed to graze

Choose one. Slow growing saplings, or sheep grazing on slow growing saplings.

> The problem is that many techniques to regenerate fresh grass for livestock are forbidden.

Because is a forest, not a meadow. The goal shouldn't be to breed sheep here. Farmers are always pressing to remove just a few trees, to make space, to burn bush for "regenerating grass". In the current situation, their short term interests aren't compatible with our middle and long term survival.

> The problem is that people migrated to the city

Good. Most wildfires are caused by people

[chrisjj]

And cats. Don't forget cats.

https://edition.cnn.com/2026/07/22/europe/arson-cats-italy-w...

[svara]

> Le sujet, c’est l’aridification du milieu. Pour revenir à cet incendie, ce n’est pas un problème de culture, mais de climat.

A bit of a distinction without a difference. The climate is not changing back, it's the new normal. In that climate, this particular kind of agriculture (huge pine monocultures) has become a problem.

It breaks my heart to say this, I've spent nearly all my childhood summers in my family's summer house down there. This year, I left just a few days before the evacuation order would have come.

It's going to be burning every year now and if we want to be safe there, the forest can't stay the same.

[palata]

> The climate is not changing back, it's the new normal.

Climate won't get any "new normal" until we reach strictly zero emission.

As long as we emit CO2, climate will get worse. There is no new normal: every year it will get worse.

It doesn't invalidate your point though, that it cannot stay the same and we have to do something. I'm just nitpicking on the "new normal". There won't be a new normal until we stop emitting CO2, it will just get worse and worse.

[rolandog]

To add to your point, it's also worthwhile to mention that there are stakeholders against solving the climate crisis of global warming (besides the usual suspects like producers of non-renewables like oil companies): some countries benefit from the climate change like the US and Mexico (they get higher agricultural yields IIRC) [0].

[0]: https://youtu.be/eRoU3whzX_Q?t=450

ETA: clarification

[let_rec]

Agree about global warming.

However, Fontainebleau forest has many pine trees.

In fact there is an invasive caterpillar there that lives in pine trees https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_processionary

The caterpillars are also a consequence of warming.

[howlden]

Can confirm from my own experience that Fontainebleau forest is partly pine forests (40% according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forest_of_Fontainebleau#Fauna,...).

[Arodex]

And it does burn, but here are the history of fire:

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incendies_en_for%C3%AAt_de_Fon...

Notice how the last was worse by one or two orders of magnitude.

You can handwave all you want the this and the southwest forests are particularly flammable, but what you are pointing out are only "canaries in the coal mines": they are the first to burn, but other forests will follow suit if global warming continues.

[holoduke]

We have these fires in france since I was born in early 80s. As far as I remember we had them almost every year. Nothing new about it. Doesn't say that global warming doesn't exist. But to shut of any discussion because of global warming is just wrong

[mytailorisrich]

Depending on the area that has always been the case, indeed.

In fact, in the most historically prone areas, the Mediterranean part of France, number of fires and surface area burnt have tended to decrease over time since the 1970s [1], which shows that being prepared works and this experience must now be used in more areas of the country.

[1] https://observatoire.foret.gouv.fr/themes/l-historique-des-f...

[svara]

Absolutely not. I've spent nearly every summer in the last 30 years in that region and it never was like this; it also wasn't that warm.

Occasional fires, sure. But very clearly nothing approaching the current scale and frequency.

The last really big one in that region was in 2022; and there are currently not one but 2 parallel fires in the same forest.

[palata]

Not shutting the discussion of course, but it's important to realise that in the early 80s, that was exceptional.

Now it will happen more and more every year, there is no stopping that trend.

[Arodex]

I am also French, I am also born in the early 80s and I can't understand how someone like you could have such an asinine take. This isn't of the same magnitude. Get out of "vibes" and burying your head in the sand and look at the total surface burnt, look at water levels in nappes phréatiques, look at temperature records and total days of canicule...

[Kon5ole]

>The main reason the forest is burning is global warming.

I get where you're coming from but I don't think this is helpful.

Everyone with any sense knows global warming will cause heatwaves and they increase the risk of fires, but nobody in France can do anything about it. Even if everyone in France would do everything they can to stop global warming starting tomorrow, it would change nothing. It wouldn't help even if they got all of the EU on board.

What the people of France can do is demand more resources for fire protection, build air conditioned locations for the poor and elderly, plant trees for shade and so on.

This can be done immediately and will actually help. It also engages everyone, even a climate denier can get onboard with fighting fires and having shelter for heat.

If we stop at "it's the global warming", the response is either apathy or policies. We should prioritize things that will help right now.

[Arodex]

>Everyone with any sense knows global warming will cause heatwaves and they increase the risk of fires, but nobody in France can do anything about it. Even if everyone in France would do everything they can to stop global warming starting tomorrow, it would change nothing. It wouldn't help even if they got all of the EU on board.

You are falling for the voting fallacy: "my vote had a miniscule effect on the final result, why should I vote?". The paradox is that at the end, if everyone thinks so, nobody votes.

See also: collective action problem.

[Kon5ole]

>You are falling for the voting fallacy

>See also: collective action problem.

I think you misread me - I'm not saying "Don't try to stop global warming", I'm saying "Don't focus on global warming when there is a forest fire".

The nation of France has a decent chance of preventing forest fires within their borders, but it won't happen by subsidizing electric cars or buying carbon credits. It will happen by adding firefighters, fire trucks, better training and such.

I'm not saying one thing has to exclude the other, but in this case they are competing for some of the same money.

Carbon credits and big conferences to discuss Paris agreements could pay for a *lot* of firefighters.

[yostrovs]

Moreover, because the warming is global and the whole world needs to be part of the solution, we need all the governments of the world to agree to some universal plan of action. This is governments that have trouble agreeing on most things within their respective borders, let alone globally.

[remus]

> A part of the Fontainebleau forest, much more north, no pine trees, went in smoke earlier. Forests are burning near Madrid.

Small correction, but Fontainebleau is a fairly mixed forest including 20-30% pine.

[dolmen]

Small correction, but the area of the Fontainebleau forest where the main fire occurred doesn't have this balance : les Trois Pignons, as name says, has a much higher density of pine trees.

[ifwinterco]

There’s also a significant amount of pretty sudden local warning in the North Atlantic region because of the sudden removal of sulphur emissions from ships a few years ago (thanks, IMO…).

And on top of that it’s El Niño.

Edit: Before anyone misconstrues what I'm saying: no, I'm not denying global warming. I'm just saying this is why this summer in particular was always likely to be a hot one in Europe.

And going forwards the sulphur thing has most likely caused a step change from temperatures in Europe before Covid, despite underlying warming continuing at the same rate

[Earw0rm]

The current El Niño hasn't really had time to affect NW Europe yet, there's quite some lag there AIUI.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

Regardless of your view on global warming, what's also vitally important is we don't do proper forest management anymore.

We used to thin the trees and clear the underbrush, which drastically reduces flammability and the ability for forest fires to rapidly spread.

But that's not seen as "environmentally friendly" these days.

[bryanrasmussen]

Well, Denmark is I believe a country very big on being seen as "environmentally friendly" and they thin trees, generally to restore habitats and increase diversity of species. What gives?

[palata]

The best way to prevent forest fires is to cut all the trees. No forest means no forest fire, right?

The problem (as always) is that it is complicated.

We are living in a mass extinction right now (orders of magnitudes faster than the one of the dinosaurs), mostly because of habitat loss. It has nothing to do with the climate (of course the climate is making it worse, but we screwed the biodiversity before that).

Is thinning the trees and clearing the underbrush good for the biodiversity? Probably not. Is it good to reduce flammability? Probably yes.

But I don't think it is fair to say that those who care about biodiversity are obviously wrong because preserving the biodiversity make forest more flammable. If you think like this, the solution is to go live in a bunker. Many people find that attractive (just look at how many dream about living in a bunker on mars), but I don't.

[Ma8ee]

Don't put this on the environmentalists when the simple explanation isn't short term cost effective to do this. If you need to put some big blanket blame, then blame capitalism. If nothing else because it has so far stopped all effective measure to stop the climate crisis.

[Marsymars]

And in other areas, e.g. Canada, "cost prohibitive" is underselling the magnitude of the logistical task of doing anything to the overwhelming majority of boreal forests. There's just so much forest, and no way to access most of it, that it's effectively impossible to do any forest management or anything about most fires. (Most fires don't come near population centres, so nothing need be done about them.)

[swiftcoder]

I wonder what happened to the sparse and/or nomadic populations that used to inhabit and manage such areas of forest across North America...

[Marsymars]

Cultural burns are infeasible for forest management at scale. Paywalled, but not too difficult to get access to: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-canada-wildf...

"Prescribed burning to reduce fire hazards has been employed throughout large parts of Australia. Yet robust scientific evidence showing that it is effective is remarkably limited. In some places, prescribed burning can reduce fire severity and restrict fire spread for a few years, but afterwards the regrowing vegetation becomes more flammable – an increased fire-risk effect that can last for many decades."

"A sobering fact is that prescribed burning makes very little difference in extreme-fire weather – precisely the conditions when most houses are lost and people die. One of us (Prof. Lindenmayer) lived through many weeks of extensive prescribed burns around the town of Marysville in the Australian state of Victoria. Just months later, in February, 2009, the entire town was razed by wildfire; all but a few buildings were destroyed and 34 people died. "

"Whilst Australia’s First Nations used cultural fires for hunting, promoting food growth and clearing pathways, it was not used for asset protection. The areas they burned were small and very localized."

"The huge scale and often very high intensity of the prescribed burns now being lit are the polar opposite of how First Nations people burnt the land. These massive-scale burns have significant negative impacts on the environment, on human health, and on Australia’s wildlife. For instance, medical data quite clearly show that Australians are far more likely to die from respiratory problems linked with prescribed burning than they are to die in a wildfire."

"An important fact – from an analysis of ice cores – is that many megafires have occurred in Australia over the past 2,000 years, even though First Nations people were applying cultural burns."

"Beyond the issue of the questionable effectiveness of widespread prescribed burns, scientific studies in Australia show that forests that are logged and then regenerated are characterized by a pulse of elevated flammability that can last for 40 to 70 years.

[andsoitis]

> blame capitalism. If nothing else because it has so far stopped all effective measure to stop the climate crisis.

Growth-driven ecological harm isn’t unique to capitalism.

[Ma8ee]

And? Capitalism is the current system, and the one that is actively thwarting efforts to mitigate the disaster. I don't see how the existence of other systems that would be equally bad or worse is relevant.

[andsoitis]

> I don't see how the existence of other systems that would be equally bad or worse is relevant.

Consumerism, the growth imperative, absence of proper carbon pricing, etc. ultimately cause ecological harm and are not exclusive to capitalism. Centrally planned economies have done the same. So you will have to address these, even if you have a different economic system.

Keep also in mind that capitalism has driven the technologies now central to decarbonization, like solar, batteries, etc., largely through market competition and innovation incentives.

[apelapan]

Wealth is a sharper answer than capitalism, even though it is an overlapping one.

To manage forrests and and other agriculture in the traditional way, we need extreme amounts of extreme poverty. We need millions and millions of people who are happy to spend 14 hours per day collecting sticks and tending sheep in the woods, in exchange for nothing more than a bowl of porridge. And they need to this every day all their lives.

We don't have that kind of poverty since capitalism took over from feudalism.

There are other ways than capitalism to build wealth in a society, but to the degree that they work and actually reduce poverty, they will have the same outcome.

[jimnotgym]

I would happily live in the forest and keep a subsistence holding whilst managing the forest. Just give me minimum wage, a small startup grant, a couple of hundred acres of forest and freedom from property taxes.... I'll bundle all the sticks up for kindling. I'll create firebreaks, increase diversity. Genuine offer

[Ma8ee]

I’m referring to the climate disaster in my last comment. It’s global warming that is the main culprit. There has never been a class of people tending Canada’s forests by collecting sticks.

[rightbyte]

I don't think multispecies plantations with thinning (until the trees are big enough) requires serfs eating only porridge.

Like, there are motor saws nowadays.