Russian wildfire smoke reaches the NORTH POLE 2,000 miles away in historic first – as raging forest blazes sparked by drought threaten nuclear research centre
Fires blazing in the Siberian wilderness have sent smoke tumbling towards the North Pole for the first time in history and are today threatening nuclear research labs and forcing the evacuation of thousands of homes.
The vast, thick, acrid mass of smoke emitted from hundreds of forest fires has unfurled itself for 2,000 miles from east to west and from 2,500 miles from north to south.
This week the smoke from Siberia’s Yakutia Republic reached the North Pole, a distance of more than 1,800 miles, in what scientists at NASA believe is a world first, while Chinese officials reported that the smoke had also spread across parts of Mongolia, a distance of 1,200 miles.
The forest fires have been fuelled by hot weather and a 150-year draught, which experts believe is the result of man-made climate change.
Already 505 megatons of carbon dioxide has been spewed into the atmosphere, with several weeks left to run on this year’s fire season. Last year, 450 megatons were released in the entire season.
Now the raging forest fires are threatening a top-secret Russian nuclear research centre in the town of Sarov where a state of emergency has been declared.
Sarov is the base of leading nuclear research and dedicated to designing Vladimir Putin’s latest strategic missiles including his new hypersonic arsenal.
Fires in the nearby Mordovski Nature Reserve are causing alarm and a major effort is underway to hold back the flames, according to reports.
Russia has deployed its firefighting aviation including IL-76 aircraft, BE-200 plane and -six Mi-8 helicopters to make dozens of water bomb drops aiming to contain the raging fires.
Some 300 workers from Sarov including the Russian national guard have been redeployed to fight the fires, and more than 600 are actively tackling the blazes, say reports.
A state of emergency was called by Sarov’s senior official Aleksey Safonov, a move that will permit more fight-fighting capability to be deployed.
A video showed the fire-fighting efforts and the smoke engulfing Sarov, the main location for the production and development of Russia’s latest nuclear weapons.
State TV ran reports warning of the fire threat to the Russian Federal Nuclear Centre.
Only Srov residents and visitors with special passes are permitted to pass its checkpoints.
Elsewhere officials in the Siberian villages of Kalvitsa and Kharyyalakh were also evacuating residents because the fires had surrounded their homes.
A dozen villages in northeastern Yakutia republic were threatened by the fires, according to the regional task force dealing with the emergency.
Source:- Daily Mail
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