Alaska To Melt And Burn

8 Responses to Alaska To Melt And Burn

1. Amino Acids in Meteorites says:

   July 31, 2011 at 4:57 am

   Alaska is a campfire marshmallow?

   Reply
2. Me says:

   July 31, 2011 at 5:03 am

   Or it was caused by something like this.

   http://hauntingthelibrary.wordpress.com/2011/01/13/environmentalist-starts-israels-worst-ever-fire-greenpeace-blames-global-warming/

   Reply
3. Gator says:

   July 31, 2011 at 12:48 pm

   Run for your lives, it’s a tundra fire! Too bad they did not have a Walmart nearby…

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HtvKGm_H1I

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4. J Calvert N says:

   July 31, 2011 at 1:23 pm

   The fire was 400 sq miles. (20 miles by 20 miles – is that “huge”?) And it “released as much carbon into the atmosphere as Earth’s entire Arctic tundra absorbs in a [one] year”. And it released “carbon stored over a period of 50 years” . Hmmm. Time for some simple arithmetic. (50yrs/1yr) * 400 sq miiles = 20,000 sq miles. Amazing, I thought the “Earth’s entire Arctic tundra” was bigger than that! What have I missed?

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5. J Calvert N says:

   July 31, 2011 at 1:34 pm

   More bad reporting by newspaper hacks. It seems they should have written 10,000 years – not 50 years.

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6. suyts says:

   July 31, 2011 at 2:23 pm

   “It was the largest tundra fire ever recorded, releasing carbon stored over a period of 50 years and doubling the cumulative area of Alaska tundra burned in smaller fires since 1950.”
   ==============================================================
   That’s horseshit! I don’t know how they are defining tundra, but Alaska has fires much larger than that often. My first year in Ak we had a smoke haze over the entire base, Ft. Wainwright, for over a month, because of a fire………..

   1 Acre = 0.0015625 Square Miles Again, I don’t know how they are defining “tundra”, but the interior and north Alaska is basically all tundra.

   2007, in fact, was a light year for Alaskan fires. 509 fires for a total of 649,411.4 acres or a little more than 1000 sq. miles. But!!, 2004 had 696 fires for a total of 6,523,182.4 acres or over 10,000 square miles!!

   In 2004 there was an individual fire that burned 2004 Taylor Complex Alaska Division of Forestry – AK 1,305,592 acres……. or 2040 sq miles.

   http://forestry.alaska.gov/firestats/

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   • suyts says:

     July 31, 2011 at 2:25 pm

     Also see here for recent national large fires..1997-2009…http://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/fireInfo_stats_lgFires.html

     Reply
   • Gator says:

     July 31, 2011 at 2:45 pm

     The area defined as tundra lies at the extreme northern reaches of Alaska. To put in terms of your home, it would be the largest fire you ever had in you ashtray.

     Reply