Medicine & TechnologyA recent study of tree rings from Norilsk in the Russian Arctic and east of the Yenisei River, the largest of its kind to date, strongly suggests that man-made pollution is a lot worse than previously thought.
The 'zombie' wildfires, not directly caused by human activity, in the Arctic have been the largest fires recorded over the last 17 years. The amount of carbon and methane emitted by these large fires are record-breaking and take several months to contain.
Environmentalists assessed the damage of Russia's most disastrous oil spill last week, concluding that the clean-up may take five to ten years, costing nearly $2 Billion.
Usually, wildfires occur in the Arctic in July and August because of lightning strikes. Still, due to the unusually hot and dry season in June 2019, the fire season had started earlier. What causes the zombie fires in the Arctic? Should we worry?
The results of the analysis will finally be able to help researchers quantify how much the interactions between currents, climate, and sea ice changed throughout the last two decades.