Chile's Big Wildfires Not Necessarily Due To Climate Change After All

A deadly February wildfire in Chile could not be really
attributed to climate change, according to scientists
who determine links between weather extremes and
climate or other factors. 

You might remember how I told you in a post on February 9 about some huge, deadly wildfires in Chile.

I speculated about the fires being made worse by climate change. In the headline, I even said it was "part of a disturbing climate trend."

In this case, I was probably wrong about that. 

Increased deadly wildfires around the world are indeed a disturbing climate trend. But the growing science of attribution - which looks at the specific causes of disasters in rapid response, questions whether the Chilean wildfires really were worsened by climate change. 

 According to Climate Brief:

"Climate change did not have a statistically significant impact on the wildfires that hit Chile (in February), according to a new attribution study by the world Weather Attribution Service."

It's not that climate change had absolutely nothing to do with the Chilean fires. 

The deep dive into Chile's fires was conducted by World Weather Attribution. They use a growing field of science that can either tie a specific extreme weather event to climate change, or debunk a link to that climate change. 

Here's how World Weather Attribution puts it:

"World Weather Attribution uses weather observations and climate models to understand how climate change influences the intensity and likelihood of extreme weather events. The studies also assess the role of vulnerability and exposure in the extent of the impacts.

Most studies are performed rapidly, in the aftermath of extreme weather events - or even while they're still happening - to answer the increasingly common question: "What was the role of climate change in this event."

Their work is important to understand exactly what climate change does and doesn't do.  I - and many others - speculate during each extreme weather moment whether climate change made things worse. World Weather Attribution is applying sober science to that question.  

That would help reduce hype on any side of the political spectrum. Or at least that's the idea. Figuring out what disasters were worsened by climate change and which weren't help us find strategies to gird ourselves against future, similar disasters. Whether caused by global warming or not. 

 CHILEAN FIRE EXPLANATION

Authors of the attribution study said "global warming will likely increase the risk of fire conditions in central Chile," and that climate change is making most of the nation hotter and drier, which make wildfires more likely. 

So, climate change made the fire conditions more likely when the blazes broke out, but that added likelihood was statistically significant, according to Climate Brief.

The February fires in Chile were pretty close to the coast. Shifting weather patterns are actually - in general - making parts of coastal Chile a bit cooler.  

Probably the biggest factor behind the ferocity of the Chilean wildfires was changes in land use. 

Settlements in forested areas, an increase in non-native species and monoculture plantations all make wildfires more likely.  People have added more pine and eucalyptus trees to the mix. Both types of trees are highly flammable. 

Those settlements in the fire zone contained houses  mostly made of wood. Again, easier to burn. Much of the burned area was densely populated, with little regard for land planning. 

The fires were obviously fired by hot, dry, windy weather. The authors of the study said the kind of conditions the region had just prior to and during the firestorm were a one in 30 year event in today's climate.  

Chile Wildfires Among Most Deadly In Recent Years; Part Of Disturbing Climate Trend

A large neighborhood destroyed by deadly wildfires in
Chile over the past week. 

 The death toll from wildfires in Chile had risen to at least 130 as of Tuesday afternoon as the blazes tore through some densely populated areas in the middle of the South American nation.  

The fires in Chile's Valparaiso region has also left hundreds of people missing and destroyed thousands of homes. 

The fires are likely the deadliest in Chilean history. I'm surprised this calamity hasn't been in the news more than it has. 

Reports BBC:

"President Gabriel Boric said the blaze was 'the worst catastrophe to hit the country since the earthquake of 27 February 2010,'  in which more than 500 people died."

At least 15,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed. Whole neighborhoods are gone. The fires spread so fast amid strong winds that many people had no time to flee, which is why there's such a high death toll.

And it is high, by any measure.  

Says Yale Climate Connections: 

"According to statistics from EM-DAT, the international disaster database, this makes the fires the fifth deadliest worldwide since 1900."

There's been a disturbing increase in wildfire deaths in the past decade or so. With this Chilean fire, five of the top ten deadliest wildfires since 1900 have occurred since 2018. Only two of the top 10 deadliest fires hit before 1987. 

You can't help but wonder if climate change is a part of this trend. Of course, more and more people are living in the urban/wildlands interface, where development impinges on sometimes dangerously dry forests. So that's a big part of the issue and the danger. 

Climate change is making some droughts more likely and more intense. This seems to be the case for Chile, with is suffering through what is probably an unprecedented mega-drought. 

According to Yale Climate Connections:

"The fires were stoked by near-record warm temperatures that have affected central Chile in recent weeks, with temperatures up to 42.9 Celsius (109°F). The accompanying lack of rainfall has created extreme drought and very dangerous fire conditions. 

These conditions came on top of the Central Chile megadrought that began in 2010 - the region' longest drought in at least 1,000 years. The drought has brought precipitation 25-45 percent below average, lowering reservoirs and causing tensions and social unrest over water availability."

The tensions and social unrest that the climate crisis encourages is especially disturbing to me, as you might have gathered from some of my previous posts. 

By the way, there have also been destructive fires in Columbia. And the Amazon basin is in drought. Studies indicate the Amazon drought was caused more by climate change than El Nino, which is also contributing to the problem. 

 Yes, the droughts and storms and other disasters brought on by climate change are bad enough as they directly end or ruin lives.

These increased and intensified disasters help create large scale economic turmoil, and political unrest as governments find themselves either unable or unwilling to help the populations affected by these disaster.

This spills over into other nations.  The United States border crisis is driven by poverty mixed with political chaos and violence in other nations. Climate change is likely a still small but growing part of that chaos and violence.

To say the least, the United States is not handling our border issues well at all. Politics over actual problem solving, apparently. 

We - and the rest of the world - need to get their act together. Otherwise, everything is just going to keep getting worse. Even for those of us left unscathed by the direct consequences of climate change.