High Fens, Belgium, 16 August (Brussles Morning Newspaper) Hundreds of people have been forced to leave their homes as a Belgium wildfire sweeps across the High Fens, burning around 3,000 hectares of the protected landscape and stretching emergency services close to the German border.
This is huge compared to what little nature we have in Belgium… Appears to be the largest wildfire ever recorded here.
On this map you can see the size of the burnt area on an OpenStreetMap basemap. The whole core of the High Fens - the area with the largest actual fen area - has burnt down entirely. (source data)
It’s a peat area, so the fire continues underground. Back of envelope calculations say that this fire may be equivalent to about 1% of annual CO2 pollution of Belgium. Expected political consequences: none. Expected increased attention for climate change: zero.
About the same reaction we had after we lost about 2000 people (the highest excess death rate in Europe) in the June heat wave: crickets. Of course, the majority of dead people were old, so who cares. The day the heat wave started, this was our defense minister:
It’s been hot for two days, and we’re all going to die again, just like that. Man, man, those journalists—where do they keep finding them? Enjoy the beautiful weather. And LIVE! (Photos coming soon of the pool, a cold Stella, and the barbecue.)
[EDIT: the screenshot is likely a bit exaggerated, as it is based on satellite detection of heat. The huge smoke plume will also show up as burned, the area west of the highway should normally be mostly spared]
I thought you were joking or exaggerating with that quote!
Nope.
One more for the collection of “quotes that should have ended a career… but didn’t”. Other faves are “the purpose of a tree has always been to be cut down” (Schauvliege, minister of the environment) or “all of us will have to tighten our belts” (prime minister Peeters, forgetting that poor people exist).
I hope the world will take this more seriously now, I have no hope for Trump
In the EU, there’s been a shift to centre-right in the latest elections, and there are “more immediate concerns” now (after covid, the new excuse became defense and keeping our industrial sector alive). So progress has slowed down a lot here too. Here in Belgium, utter silence so far - both on the fires and the heat deads.