Compound dry-hot-fire events connecting Central and Southeastern South America: an unapparent and deadly ripple effect

South America has experienced severe compound drought-heatwaves (CDHW), exacerbating fires. Recently, the unprecedented Pantanal 2020 fire season (P20F), burning a third of the biome, resulted in well-reported local impacts on the ecosystem, economy, and health. Nevertheless, the long-range ripple e...

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Published in:npj natural hazards Vol. 1; no. 1; pp. 32 - 13
Main Authors: Monteiro dos Santos, Djacinto, de Oliveira, Aline M., Duarte, Ediclê S. F., Rodrigues, Julia A., Menezes, Lucas S., Albuquerque, Ronaldo, Roque, Fabio de O., Peres, Leonardo F., Hoelzemann, Judith J., Libonati, Renata
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 08.11.2024
Nature Publishing Group
Nature Portfolio
Subjects:
4014/4005
704/106
704/172
704/4111
Air pollution
Atmospheric boundary layer
Atmospheric Sciences
Climate change
Drought
Earth and Environmental Science
Earth Sciences
Environmental impact
Environmental Policy
Feedback
Fires
Forest & brush fires
Health risks
Heat waves
Natural Hazards
Older people
Outdoor air quality
Particulate matter
Precipitation
Public health
Records & achievements
Risk management
Vegetation
South America
Brazil
ISSN:2948-2100, 2948-2100
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:South America has experienced severe compound drought-heatwaves (CDHW), exacerbating fires. Recently, the unprecedented Pantanal 2020 fire season (P20F), burning a third of the biome, resulted in well-reported local impacts on the ecosystem, economy, and health. Nevertheless, the long-range ripple effects of this event remain unknown. We investigated the P20F-related cascading hazards, integrating models, observational and satellite-based data. P20F-related smoke elevated PM 2.5 levels in the SA’s most populated area, exceeding WHO guidelines by up to 600%. Smoke-induced air pollution episodes coincided with widespread heatwaves, amplifying health risks. The mortality burden attributable to this multi-hazard short-term (14 days) exposure was estimated to be 2150 premature deaths (21% increase above expected levels). Our findings highlight that the impacts of CDHW-fires in SA are beyond the local level, implying growing challenges for risk management and public health and the need for governance based on telecoupled flows, linking different systems over multiple scales.
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ISSN:2948-2100
2948-2100
DOI:10.1038/s44304-024-00031-w