Wildfires devastate the Pantanal wetlands in Brazil
The Brazilian Pantanal should be green, lush and wet at this time of year.
But now the inhabitants are fighting wildfires. There has been no rain for months, the vegetation is burning like tinder. Although dry periods with bushfires are normal for the Pantanal, this year the fires came much earlier and with greater force. Firefighter José Francisco Morel is worried.
‘The Pantanal urgently needs rain. Otherwise we will experience one of the worst droughts ever and have to fight many more wildfires,’ he fears.
The El Nino weather phenomenon is causing more hot and dry air to flow into the Pantanal. But that’s not the only reason for the fires.
‘The Pantanal is suffering from lack of water because it rains less due to deforestation in the Amazon region. And massive deforestation in the Cerrado region means there is also less water in the rivers,’ says scientist Pedro Luiz Cortes from the University of Sao Paulo.
The inhabitants are also noticing the changes in the climate. Zilda dos Santos is a fisher like her parents and grandparents before her. She remembers:
‘A long time ago, my grandfather said to me: ‘I won't live to see it, but you will: the world will end in fire.’ And that's exactly what I'm experiencing now. I'm 54 years old and now everything is burning.’