21-07-24 06 Lytton BC Burned Down
New York Times, July 12, 2021
Heat Wave Spread Fire That ‘Erased’ Canadian Town
By Vjosa Isai
Busloads of residents went to tour the charred town of Lytton, British Columbia, this week and found it almost unrecognizable.
TORONTO — Something strange was happening to the acacia trees in Lytton, British Columbia. The small town in Western Canada had seen three days of extreme heat that each broke national temperature records by June 30, rising to 121 degrees. That morning at the Lytton Chinese History Museum, Lorna Fandrich noticed the green leaves dropping off the trees surrounding the building, she said, apparently unable to tolerate the heat. Hours later, Lytton was on fire. A village of fewer than 300 people, nestled among mountain ranges, and prone to hot summers, the town was consumed by flames that destroyed 90 percent of it, killed two and injured several others, the authorities said.
Investigators are probing whether local rail traffic is responsible for starting the fire, which was exacerbated by the heat, amid temperatures that climate researchers say would virtually not be possible without human-caused global warming. On Friday, when a path was finally cleared of downed power lines, bricks and other debris to make way for five buses taking residents to tour the town, the village was almost unrecognizable, the residents said. Mounds of warped metal and disfigured wood poked out of gutted buildings. Whatever brick walls remained were often scarred by black scorch marks.
Matilda and Peter Brown saw that their house has been destroyed, leaving just the skeleton of a traditional Indigenous hut used to air dry salmon. “That was our home,” Ms. Brown said through tears. “That was our sanctuary. Right now we have no place.”
The extreme heat wave that blasted through much of the Pacific Northwest at the end of June spurred widespread wildfires, a drastic spike in heat-related deaths and environmental devastation that wiped out millions of coastal wildlife.
21-07-24 06 Lytton BC Burned Down
New York Times, July 12, 2021
Heat Wave Spread Fire That ‘Erased’ Canadian Town
By Vjosa Isai
Busloads of residents went to tour the charred town of Lytton, British Columbia, this week and found it almost unrecognizable.
TORONTO — Something strange was happening to the acacia trees in Lytton, British Columbia. The small town in Western Canada had seen three days of extreme heat that each broke national temperature records by June 30, rising to 121 degrees. That morning at the Lytton Chinese History Museum, Lorna Fandrich noticed the green leaves dropping off the trees surrounding the building, she said, apparently unable to tolerate the heat. Hours later, Lytton was on fire. A village of fewer than 300 people, nestled among mountain ranges, and prone to hot summers, the town was consumed by flames that destroyed 90 percent of it, killed two and injured several others, the authorities said.
Investigators are probing whether local rail traffic is responsible for starting the fire, which was exacerbated by the heat, amid temperatures that climate researchers say would virtually not be possible without human-caused global warming. On Friday, when a path was finally cleared of downed power lines, bricks and other debris to make way for five buses taking residents to tour the town, the village was almost unrecognizable, the residents said. Mounds of warped metal and disfigured wood poked out of gutted buildings. Whatever brick walls remained were often scarred by black scorch marks.
Matilda and Peter Brown saw that their house has been destroyed, leaving just the skeleton of a traditional Indigenous hut used to air dry salmon. “That was our home,” Ms. Brown said through tears. “That was our sanctuary. Right now we have no place.”
The extreme heat wave that blasted through much of the Pacific Northwest at the end of June spurred widespread wildfires, a drastic spike in heat-related deaths and environmental devastation that wiped out millions of coastal wildlife.