The situation in Bordeaux right now feels close to apocalyptic. I left yesterday. Two hundred thousand people are evacuated, hundreds of homes destroyed, and the fire about 10 miles from the edge of the city.
I also left yesterday. I thought the mood was still surprisingly calm, considering that there was already enough smoke in the city to make it look like a foggy winter day and smell heavily of campfire.
Now I am wondering if my return flight from Bordeaux in a few days will actually happen. Currently the airport is still operating, although the surrounding area has been evacuated. It really looks apocalyptic there, though:
Just had the same here in Washington state for the Little Giant fire. Great image in the article. We had another fire cloud behind Rainier the other day, and saw it from the Rount Mainier farm - it really looked like the volcano was smoking up and ready to top-off. <clench>
Good to know that european countries are all spending to buy weapons instead of buying firefighting helicopters and planes… who needs those right? Every summer it's the same thing… like we never had another summer where everything was on fire before.
If you the are in the area and hesitating to evacuate, or if you want to realize what terrible phenomenon you are you facing. Watch this great documentary about the tragedy that unfolded in Portugal a few years ago. Leave now.
There's a good chance that conflagrations during WWII generated such clouds. There are well established incidents of such in Germany (and Japan) (ref: https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/91/9/2010bam... , Hamburg, Dresden, etc) but nothing for certain in France. The British attacks on Royan which destroyed 85% of it with high explosive and napalam would be the most likely site.
Unsurprisingly, that was just propaganda from some rich locals protecting their market power. What was really surprising was the number of people around here asking some army to come murder Brazilians.
But then, it's real that Bolsonaro was criminally negligent on fire-avoidance. What we will discover next year is how much of it could be avoided at all.
The situation in Bordeaux right now feels close to apocalyptic. I left yesterday. Two hundred thousand people are evacuated, hundreds of homes destroyed, and the fire about 10 miles from the edge of the city.
I also left yesterday. I thought the mood was still surprisingly calm, considering that there was already enough smoke in the city to make it look like a foggy winter day and smell heavily of campfire.
Now I am wondering if my return flight from Bordeaux in a few days will actually happen. Currently the airport is still operating, although the surrounding area has been evacuated. It really looks apocalyptic there, though:
https://static.actu.fr/uploads/2026/07/aeroport-bordeaux-fum...
What resources would you recommend to follow this event as it continues?
NASA FIRMS is good for tracking where the fire is. As well as the site another user recommended, I was following this one: https://feuxgironde.fr/
It’s in French but this crowd sourced website updates quite quickly : https://feuxdeforet.fr/gironde-33/saumos-22-07-2026-4367/
Everyone in Southern Europe who hate tourists are about to get their wish!
Just had the same here in Washington state for the Little Giant fire. Great image in the article. We had another fire cloud behind Rainier the other day, and saw it from the Rount Mainier farm - it really looked like the volcano was smoking up and ready to top-off. <clench>
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/climate-lab/little...
https://archive.is/20260725052942/https://www.seattletimes.c...
"East" of Seattle is certainly one way to describe it (100 miles east).
Good to know that european countries are all spending to buy weapons instead of buying firefighting helicopters and planes… who needs those right? Every summer it's the same thing… like we never had another summer where everything was on fire before.
Don't look up
If you the are in the area and hesitating to evacuate, or if you want to realize what terrible phenomenon you are you facing. Watch this great documentary about the tragedy that unfolded in Portugal a few years ago. Leave now.
"Witness to Disaster | National Geographic" - https://youtu.be/clTeqIpGBeU
https://youtu.be/clTeqIpGBeU?t=1734
There's a good chance that conflagrations during WWII generated such clouds. There are well established incidents of such in Germany (and Japan) (ref: https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/91/9/2010bam... , Hamburg, Dresden, etc) but nothing for certain in France. The British attacks on Royan which destroyed 85% of it with high explosive and napalam would be the most likely site.
So, if you used climate credits, to build up those forrests. Do they get nil and void, if those forrests burn up?
That's remember me of https://www.france24.com/en/20190824-macron-france-brazil-bo...
Unsurprisingly, that was just propaganda from some rich locals protecting their market power. What was really surprising was the number of people around here asking some army to come murder Brazilians.
But then, it's real that Bolsonaro was criminally negligent on fire-avoidance. What we will discover next year is how much of it could be avoided at all.