250,000 Acres Burned In Portugal So Far As Fires Return - AFP

[hatrack]

Firefighters in drought-hit Portugal battled nine separate forest fires Friday in the centre and north of the country as a rise in temperatures brought a return of blazes which have destroyed over 100,000 hectares (247,000 acres) of land so far this year.

More than 700 firefighters backed by 209 vehicles and 11 water-dropping aircraft were at the scene of the fires which raged in six of Portugal's 18 administrative districts, emergency services officials said.

EDIT

The fires have charred 15,500 hectares of protected land, roughly 15 percent of the total amount of land in the nation's natural parks, the environment ministry said Friday. The wildfires have caused at least eight deaths, including that of six firefighters and destroyed dozens of homes and farm buildings.

Experts blame human negligence, the abandonment of rural areas and a focus on planting profitable but highly combustible tree species such as fast-growing eucalyptus and pine trees for the large number of wildfires in the country.

EDIT/END

http://www.terradaily.com/2005/050812192556.iga145c1.html

[Dogmudgeon]

1. Trees don't grow in deserts

And that's what the whole Iberian Peninsula is becoming, a desert.

Global warming is drying it out with heat; an Ice Age would deny it moisture, as well, and the Pyrenees would keep the moisture north.

The whole Mediterranean basin would become drier, too, though I'm not certain it would desertify.

The Asian desert is spreading out of Mongolia into more parts of China. The Sonoran Desert is spreading. And the temperate zone of South America is becoming drier, although the Atacama is pretty well isolated in the Andes.

More water is staying in the atmosphere as a result of warming. I'm planning to buy an Ark right before the cooling phase hits. :)

--p!