California's Record Wildfires Spurred by Millions of Hidden Dead Trees

  • 📰 Newsweek
  • ⏱ Reading Time:
  • 23 sec. here
  • 2 min. at publisher
  • 📊 Quality Score:
  • News: 12%
  • Publisher: 52%

United States Headlines News

United States Latest News,United States Headlines

Detailed mapping revealed an undercount of dead trees, all sharing a specific characteristic across California.

California's record wildfires may have been spurred on by millions of hidden dead trees, according to a new study.Scientists from the University of Copenhagen studied the 2020 wildfires, applying artificial intelligence to aerial photos to create a data set of trees across the state.They discovered that individual and clustered tree death was widespread among living trees. This presents a brand new explanation for the severe wildfire season, published in Nature Communications.

''This makes it reasonable to speculate that such scattered enclaves of dead dry trees could have acted as kindling between living trees, affecting the intensity and spreading of the wildfires. This new knowledge is interesting both as a possible part of the explanation for California's violent wildfires, but also very much for our attempts at understanding the phenomenon of tree death more generally,' Horion said.

 

Thank you for your comment. Your comment will be published after being reviewed.
Please try again later.
We have summarized this news so that you can read it quickly. If you are interested in the news, you can read the full text here. Read more:

 /  🏆 468. in US

United States Latest News, United States Headlines

Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.

What's the status of California's drought as heat wave, wildfires sweep state?As California's remaining dry spots shrink, weather experts warn that sweltering heat could slow progress.
Source: physorg_com - 🏆 388. / 55 Read more »

California wildfires altering ecosystems, disrupting wildlife habitats: StudySome species are proving to be more fire resilient than others.
Source: ABC - 🏆 471. / 51 Read more »

Insurance companies are pulling out of California because of wildfiresProviding a platform for people, issues and ideas can inspire others to create solutions. That is the power of journalism and to be able to do that now on a national level is an incredible honor.
Source: 10News - 🏆 732. / 50 Read more »

Fighting fires from space in record time: How AI could prevent devastating wildfiresScientists are getting closer to detecting bushfires in record time, thanks to cube satellites with onboard AI now able to detect fires from space 500 times faster than traditional on-ground processing of imagery.
Source: ScienceDaily - 🏆 452. / 53 Read more »

Heat dome traps California under extreme temps, brings scorching record highs to SouthwestKathryn Prociv is a senior meteorologist and producer for NBC News.
Source: NBCNewsHealth - 🏆 707. / 51 Read more »

Editorial: California faces another record-breaking hot summerAfter a chilly spring, it seems hard to believe that the gloom would ever leave Southern California. But skies are clearing as a 'heat dome' brings midsummer-like temperatures to the state. It could be a preview of another record-breaking hot summer.
Source: physorg_com - 🏆 388. / 55 Read more »