EartherEarth Science

Two Raging Wildfires North of Los Angeles Could Force More Than 100,000 Evacuations

Both ends of California are on fire. While firefighters battle the Camp Fire in Northern California, their compatriots in Southern California are facing an equally harrowing situation. Spurred by the Santa Ana winds, the Woolsey and Hill fires are wreaking havoc just north of Los Angeles with an estimated 75,000 homes under evacuation orders. The … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Paradise Lost: The Camp Fire Has Reportedly Burned an Entire Town to the Ground

While dawn in California is still a few hours away, it will rise on a town completely changed. The 27,000-person community of Paradise was ravaged by the explosive Camp Fire last night. Early reports indicate the entire town was basically wiped out, and residents died or were severely burned trying to escape the inferno. “Pretty … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Video Shows the Terrifying Drive to Escape Massive Fire in Paradise, California

The so-called Camp Fire has already consumed over 20,000 acres in Northern California, forcing about 50,000 people to evacuate. But the fire has moved so quickly that some people have barely escaped—like Brynn Parrott Chatfield from the town of Paradise, who posted this video to social media showing her family’s terrifying drive through the flames … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Explosive Northern California Wildfire Is Consuming 80 Acres of Land a Minute

An incredibly dangerous wildfire has exploded to life in Northern California. The Camp Fire has spurred numerous evacuations in Butte County as it races across the landscape. The fire was first reported at 6:30 a.m. PT, and grew to at least 5,000 acres in three hours. California’s state fire agency reported the fire is “very … Continued

EartherEnvironmental Justice

Black and Native American Communities Are More Likely to Lose it All in Wildfires

Natural disasters don’t hit everyone equally. We know this is true when it comes to hurricanes, and a new study indicates a similar pattern of discrimination exists regarding the impacts of wildfires. More than 29 million people are threatened by wildfires across the U.S., but especially in the West and Southeast, according to a new … Continued

EartherEarth Science

How the Weather Channel’s Immersive Visualizations Make Climate Change Visceral

Firestorm. Storm surge. EF-5 tornado. If you pay attention to the weather, these are undoubtably terms you’ve heard, along with dire warnings from meteorologists to heed any and all evacuation warnings. But the Weather Channel has upped the ante by creating what it calls mixed reality segments that drive home the risks in a way … Continued

ScienceBiology

The Devilish (and Dare We Say Brilliant) Way Australia’s Feral Cats Use Fire to Hunt Down Prey

It’s hard to imagine your housecat as a particularly savvy killer. Sure, it may swat at a shoelace dangled in its face, or bunny-kick its favorite fish toy when it’s in, you know, a mood. It may even catch a bug now and then. But your cat probably spends most of the day delicately curled … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Border Agent Who Started Wildfire With Explosive ‘Gender Reveal’ Party Must Pay $220,000

An Arizona border patrol agent started a wildfire during a “gender reveal” party involving a firearm and explosives, likely making it the most expensive such celebration in the history of the ridiculous ritual. Dennis Dickey was off-duty when he celebrated the revelation of his unborn child’s sex on state-owned property close to Madera Canyon in … Continued

EartherEarth Science

A Giant Wildfire Has Cut off Yellowstone’s Southern Gateway

All summer long, national parks have been lit up, shut down, and damaged by destructive wildfires. Now, it seems the trend has continued into fall. The golden aspens-covered Tetons were inaccessible to some on Sunday as a wildfire—dubbed the Roosevelt Fire—exploded southeast of Grand Teton National Park. Burning in the Bridger-Teton National Forest, it shut … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Canadian Firenado Steals Firefighters’ Hose, Hits Them With Burning Logs

It is becoming increasingly clear the planet is trying to tell us it is sick of our crap and it is done playing. The latest example? A firenado sucking a team of firefighters’ hose into the sky. The surreal footage comes from British Columbia, which you may remember saw day turn into the night due … Continued

Tech News

Feud Week, Dungeons & Dragons, Shooting Bigfoot, and IFA 2018: Best Gizmodo Stories of the Week

Here at Gizmodo, we’ve just wrapped up Feud Week: A series on personality and business clashes in the tech world, scientific disputes, and whether or not to shoot Bigfoot. (I say let the big guy do his thing, unless it turns out it’s kidnapping people with mind-waves to make more Bigfoots.) Some have said that … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Here’s How the Pros Fight Wildfires

If the summer of 2018 has proven one thing, it’s that fighting large wildfires is serious business. But how exactly do we do it? Contrary to what some politicians might think, it takes a lot more than rivers of water. There are currently more than 20,700 people combatting active fires in the U.S. according to … Continued

EartherEarth Science

American Wildfire Forces Canadian National Park to Shut Down

Canada and the U.S. share a lot of things, chief among them a border. To commemorate said border, there’s a peace park that ceremonially joins Glacier National Park in the U.S. and Waterton Lakes National Park in Canada. But our peaceful relations have been riled up by the hellacious wildfire season. On Thursday, the Boundary … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Earth Is on Fire. It’s Always on Fire

A new satellite image of our planet shows fires raging across the world, from Canada to Australia to South America to Sub-Saharan Africa. But despite its striking appearance, much of this is actually quite ordinary. The map, created by NASA, denotes fires with red dots, based on heat measurements that detect fires. While it may … Continued

EartherClimate Change

As the World Burns, There Will Be Fewer Firefighters to Share

As out-of-control wildfires raged across the West, U.S. firefighting authorities took a seemingly unusual step late last month: they called up Australia and New Zealand and asked for help. It was the first time the southern hemisphere nations had been called on to fight U.S. wildfires since the summer of 2015, when 68 firefighters from … Continued

Tech News

Verizon Throttled Fire Department’s ‘Unlimited’ Plan While They Were Fighting Mendocino Complex Fire

Verizon throttled the Santa Clara County Fire Department’s supposedly “unlimited” data plan while the agency was fighting the record wildfires that have burned over one million acres of the state, Ars Technica reported on Tuesday. According to the report, Santa Clara County Fire Chief Anthony Bowden brought up the throttling in an addendum to a … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Folks, I’m Not Sure This Plan to Blow All the Wildfire Smoke Into Canada Is Gonna Work

Massive, ravaging wildfires are now the norm on the West Coast, with the state of California now regularly breaking fire records, Canada’s British Columbia experiencing the third-worst fire season in recorded history, and all the smoke from those fires spreading across much of the continent and even further. But don’t worry, an area man has … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Can We Afford to Keep Rebuilding in the Line of Wildfires?

Jessica Wentz escaped the concrete confines of New York for her childhood home of Santa Rosa, California last year. At the time, the decision seemed like a no brainer, leaving behind a landscape dominated by humans for one where homes mingled with the forest and rolling chaparral hills of Northern California. But the dream of … Continued

EartherEarth Science

Canada’s Wildfires Have Turned Day Into Night

Just when you think this wildfire season can’t get worse, something new comes along to remind you this year is truly one of rare horrors. Residents of Prince George, British Columbia—a small city 325 miles north of Vancouver—awoke to a sky seemingly devoid of sunlight. The city sits just to the east of British Columbia’s … Continued

EartherClimate Change

Ryan Zinke Has Taken His Rambling, Confused Thoughts on Climate Change and Wildfires All Over the Country

Park ranger cosplay enthusiast Ryan Zinke has had himself a couple of weeks. In the midst of a catastrophic summer of wildfires, the Secretary of the Interior has tied himself in knots trying to figure out how to talk about the role of climate change in driving those fires. Over the course of the past … Continued