West Desert mountain range view – May 26, 2021 – Nikon D500, f6.3, 1/2500, ISO 500, Nikkor 18-200mm VR at 18mm, natural light
Smoke from western wildfires has been an issue here in northern Utah for quite some time now. Our wildfire season has grown longer, stronger, and the fires themselves are more destructive.
The smoke we are experiencing in northern Utah has mostly been coming from Oregon and California. Last week the small California town of Greenville was destroyed when the Dixie Fire swept through it. The smoke we are breathing here in northern Utah contains the particulates of devastation from our neighbors to the west. The Dixie Fire, one of 107 wildfires currently burning in the west, has now burned more than 500,000 acres.
Because the Salt Lake Valley is surrounded by mountains the smoke gets trapped here sometimes for days on end. It starts to get hard to remember what smokeless days look like.
I’ve been restricting my journeys out into the field on days when I think the smoke will bother me. It gives me headaches, makes my eyes burn, and can make it hard to breathe. I haven’t been getting out much at all and that is likely to continue into the fall.
Fire can be good. It can rejuvenate. But these fires are more destructive now because of climate change.
The photo I shared today isn’t of anything special. It is a West Desert mountain range view. That smokeless blue sky though? I’d give so much to see that again here today.
With every smoky sky I see I am vividly aware that they contain particulates of devastation. The loss of homes for people and wildlife. People’s hopes, dreams, and their hard work. Bits of the forests that will be altered for generations. My brain has a hard time processing all that has been lost and that is carried here to Utah by the prevailing winds. When I think about it it becomes so damn overwhelming.
Life is good but we have to do our part now to make it better. For everyone and every thing.
Mia
Click here to see more of my West Desert scenery photos.
You BE SAFE!!!!
It is overwhelming. Heartrending. And terrifying.
It is overwhelming.
WashingtonPost on IPCC report (not behind paywall):
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/08/09/ipcc-climate-report-global-warming-greenhouse-gas-effect/
But we can do something about it:
“… In the best-case scenario, the world rapidly phases out fossil fuels, embraces renewable energy on a massive scale and overhauls how humans work, eat and travel. People eliminate emissions of carbon dioxide from coal, oil and gas. Societies find a way to curb powerful but short-lived greenhouse gases — most notably methane, which largely comes from burping cows and leaky fossil fuel facilities, and nitrous oxide, of which a huge amount comes from fertilizers used on farms. Natural systems such as forests and human inventions such as carbon-capture operations pull more and more out of the atmosphere. …”
Everyone, get on a low carbon diet today– and tell your congresspersons not to support bitcoin, which on its own can raise warming 2 degrees Celsius! https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/10/181029130951.htm
That is definitely a photo to treasure. It is sad but generally true that most people don’t know how good things were until they lose it all. Unfortunately, the IPCC now says that even if we stop emitting CO2 now, it is already too late to get back those smokeless days and skies and the best we can do now is not to make it worse.
Hearts with all our western neighbors human and non-human and with the forests.,grateful for rains here this summer in New England, but it’s all one weather. And the skies here are dusky with the smoke of western destruction
It is overwhelming to think about. I feel that way too, especially when people don’t make the connection between our human activities and the environment. Your blog and photography is inspiring, and hopefully will bring awareness to how precious the natural world is.