June 12, 2023
What We Can Learn From the Canadian Wildfires
By Eleanor Buchanan
The smoke that blanketed the US Northeast was not incidental or anomalous but yet another manifestation of accelerating anthropogenic climate change.
In September 2020, West Coast wildfires spread smoke that blackened the skies of the East Coast. I reported on the phenomenon for Inside Climate News, an exercise in detachment from the personal stakes of the issue as a New Yorker that allowed me to focus on the bigger picture. But less than three years later, such detachment feels impossible.
Like many of my fellow New Yorkers, I spent last week obsessively checking the air quality index on my phone’s weather app and live updates from the New York Times as hazardous smoke from the Canadian wildfires blanketed skies across the Northeast. Photos of the burnt-orange sun overwhelmed social media platforms. Politicians were quick to express concern, but failed to connect the conversation to the global climate crisis.
The out-of-control Canadian wildfires are not incidental or anomalous: they are a manifestation of accelerating anthropogenic climate change. The crisis has led to consistently record-breaking and drought-producing heat that makes such wildfires much more likely than in the past. With that reality in mind, the current moment offers a number of key takeaways that we should not forget even after the haze has lifted.
