RUSSIA BURNING

1. RUSSIA BURNING

2. The 2010 global warming fire and drought “world disaster” We need to pay attention to what this means for the northern hemisphere and for our planet. The world’s climate has changed. Prepared by Canadians for Action on Climate Change by Dr. Peter Carter, British Columbia, Canada

3. Russian fires are “world disaster” According to Alexei Lyakhov, director of Moscow's meteorological service, temperatures for July 2010 were 14degrees F (8 degrees Celsius) higher than normal [!!], and the heat is evidence of global warming. He says that in 130 years of daily weather monitoring in Moscow, there has never been such a hot summer. "This is not normal weather, this has never happened." Paul Della-Marta, a climate scientist working at Partner Reinsurance Company in Switzerland, said heat waves have clearly increased in temperate regions, the heavily populated areas between the polar and tropic regions. "The evidence indicates that over the last 50 years, a lot of the world's temperate areas have had a significant increase in the frequency and intensity of heat waves," Della-Marta said. "In the future, we can expect a continuation of these trends.“ Della-Marta was the lead author of a 2007 study that showed heat waves in Western Europe had doubled in frequency and nearly tripled in length since 1880.

4. Russian fires are “world disaster” The scale of the damage caused by recent forest fires in Russia's Far East amounts to a world-wide ecological disaster, a United Nations team has said. The Russian news agency, Itar-Tass, said the team was shocked by the destruction it saw on the island of Sakhalin and the vast region of Khabarovsk near the border with China. The experts said the damage would have far-reaching consequences not only for neighbouring countries, but for the entire northern hemisphere. More than 1.5 million hectares of taiga, the coniferous forestland characteristic of Siberia, have been destroyed since fires began early this year. Two-thirds of Sakhalin Island has been affected by the blazes, which have killed three people and left 700 homeless. In many places fires are still raging, despite snow and rain. Heavy smoke is preventing air surveys from being carried out and there has been difficulty finding sufficient funds to tackle the situation. President Putin has taken charge of the crisis and called in the army. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/190654.stm

5. Moscow Moscow Sites affected by the fires as reported in the media Voronezh Khabarovsk Sakhalin NASA map of global average temperature change for June 2010 compared to June 1950 GLOBAL WARMING NASA GISS

6. Heat Hits Russian Wheat Production Global Warming The IPCC assessment says there will be more droughts as the global temperature increases. Wheat Output

7. Heat Hits Russian Wheat Production It is estimated that a fifth of Russia's 2010 wheat crop has now died due to the lack of rain in what is thought to be the country's worst drought for more than a century. Global drought index for July 2010

8. Russia Burning July has been the hottest month in Moscow in 130 years of recorded history. Russian government agencies report forest fires have consumed 500,000 to 900,000 acres. Fields and forests have dried up, and much of this year's wheat harvest has been ruined. In the black earth region of southern Russia, where summer showers are the norm, the relentless sun withered 24 million acres sown with wheat, barley and other crops. By comparison, all the cultivatable land in Britain amounts to only 15 million acres. In areas of the black earth region, some of the world’s most fertile land for grain crops, not a drop of rain has fallen since April.

9. Moscow covered with smoke and smog Heavy smog has been covering Russia's capital due to the raging forest fires. Moscow has been enveloped in the dangerous grey haze with air pollution levels 8 times higher than normal. Temperatures in and around the capital have been close to 40 degrees Celsius, with drought conditions now appearing.

10. Fires almost encircled Voronezh … a city of 850,000 people, 300 miles south of Moscow. The streets of Voronezh have been filled with smog, and a giant wall of rising black smoke could be seen on the horizon.

11. Not Only Russia 2010 Heat Wave Across Northern Hemisphere This summer, most of the northern hemisphere is experiencing heat wave temperatures. Heat waves have been recorded in Ontario, Quebec, U.S. Eastern Seaboard, American Southeast, Texas, Eastern Europe, Southern England, Germany, France, Italy, Greece and Northeastern China — as well as Russia. (Land)

12. July 2010 Global Drought Index (Past 9 Months)

13. Not Only 2010 • The 2007 Southern Europe Heatwave • In 2007 Southern Europe suffered under record-breaking temperatures that caused forest fires from Serbia to Greece. • Five hundred people died in Hungary because of the heat wave, with deaths due heatstroke, cardiovascular problems and other illnesses aggravated by the high temperatures which, for example, reached a record high of 41.9ºC (107ºF) in the southern city of Kiskunhalas. • Countries across the Balkan peninsula were hit by historic temperature highs of 43ºC in Belgrade and 44ºC in Bulgaria. Fires raged across much of Greece during the hottest summer there in 100 years. • In Bosnia and Macedonia, where temperatures shot up to 45ºC— the highest for 120 years — governments declared a state of national emergency.In Romania19,000 people wereadmitted to hospital, mostly with respiratory problems from the heat. In Italy, four people were burnt to death after a brush fire trapped hundreds of tourists on beaches in the Puglia region. Emergency services used patrol boats and helicopters to whisk 450 holidaymakers and residents off the beaches to which they had rushed to try to escape the flames.

14. 2006 Heat Waves in U.S. and Europe 2006 produced heat waves in North America and western Europe. From NASA: “This image shows the difference in land surface temperatures from July 12-19, 2006, compared to the average temperatures during that period for the past six years (2000-2005).” In 2006 the European heat wave forced nuclear power plants in Spain, France, and Germany to reduce or stop production because of lowered water levels in lakes and rivers that are used to cool the reactors. Highest average July temperatures were recorded at many locations in Great Britain, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Germany.

15. The Disastrous 2003 European Heat Wave The severely hot weather that withered crops, dried up rivers, and fuelled fires in the summer of 2003 took a massive human toll. The full magnitude of this quiet catastrophe still remains largely an untold story, as data revealing the continent-wide scale have only slowly become available in the years since. All in all, more than 52,000 Europeans died from heat in the summer of 2003, making the heat wave one of the deadliest climate-related disasters in Western history. Crops in many regions of Europe took a beating that year. The drought resulted in a global carbon feedback as European plants and vegetation withered under the heat.

16. 2 Degrees C to Global Climate Catastrophe UCAR’s coupled climate model showing a 2ºC world, which is the temperature limit in the climate policies of most nations supported by most scientific organizations and NGOs. The majority of climate models show the same extremely alarming thing: The huge regions of the world’s best food-producing land in North America and Europe heat up rapidly. The world’s top food crop producing regions. The UCAR (University Corporation for Atmospheric Research)

17. 2ºC World We are now living in a +0.8C world and are absolutely committed to a doubling of that global temperature increase over the next few decades (due to the heat lag in the oceans). The evidence from the changed climate today is clear. We are in a state of most dire planetary emergency.