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EU manages record variety of actions to extreme weather condition

The European Union has coordinated a record variety of emergency reactions to extreme weather this year, as climate modification fuels wildfires and other disasters in Europe, the world's fastestwarming continent.

Europe's fire season normally peaks in June to September, but environment modification increases hot and dry conditions that have contributed to the fire season beginning earlier and burning more land.

To assist EU members and other nations that request emergency situation aid, the bloc manages and moneys the implementation of firefighting aircrafts and medical teams pooled by member nations - a system known as the EU civil security system.

It has actually been activated 31 times this year up until now in action to extreme weather condition - more weather-related releases than in any other year to date, European Commission data shared with Reuters revealed.

The plan was released 23 times in reaction to extreme weather condition in the whole of 2023.

The majority of this year's activations were to deal with wildfires. The 19 wildfire actions the EU coordinated this year currently exceed the overall in any other year in records going back to 2007. The EU civil defense plan was formed in 2001.

The EU sent out firefighting planes to Albania, Greece and the Portuguese island of Madeira last month, in response to requests for emergency situation aid from those governments.

It also sent out firefighting aircraft to Bulgaria and North Macedonia in July.

The EU's reserve fleet of 28 firefighting planes and 4 helicopters from its member countries has more than doubled because 2022, when ravaging fires in southern Europe tired its previous 13-craft capacity.

Heatwaves are ending up being hotter and longer long lasting, which dries plants, particularly in durations of low rainfall, developing tinderbox conditions, Ben Clarke, a climate scientist at Imperial College London's Grantham Institute, said. Hot and dry fire-prone conditions are increasing, notably in southern Europe.

By the time Greece's worst wildfire this year broke out in mid-August near Athens, the nation had currently faced over 3,500 fires since May, a nearly 50% increase from the same period in 2023.

Ahead of this summertime, the EU stationed 556 firefighters throughout countries consisting of Greece and Spain.

Brussels has actually also positioned orders for the first directly EU-owned firefighting airplanes, due for shipment from 2027.

(source: Reuters)