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Canada wildfire: all 20,000 Yellowknife residents evacuating (www.reuters.com)
submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by deconstruct@lemmy.world to c/worldnews@lemmy.ml
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Water bombers flew low over Yellowknife as thick smoke blanketed the capital of the vast and sparsely populated Northwest Territories. Officials say the fire, which is moving slowly, is now 15 km (10 miles) northwest of the city and could reach the outskirts by Saturday if there is no rain.

Alternate: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66526554

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[-] Stochastic@lemmy.ca 8 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

8,000 is the average annual total count, usually spread across ~3months (July, Aug, Sept). The 1,100 number quoted is currently burning today. As of August 17 the count (active and extinguished) so far this year was up to 5,765.

The size of fires is really the staggering figure with 13.75 million hectares (137,500 km² roughly the size of Arkansas or Greece) burned so far, while the average annual total burned area is usually only 2.1 million hectares.

this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2023
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