Argentine Patagonia is facing one of the biggest environmental crises in its history: a little over a month ago, a huge fire that spanned 3 provinces and has already affected almost one and a half million hectares.
The sources of fire multiplied in the provinces of La Pampa, Río Negro and Buenos Aires. Although there are no definitive figures that make it possible to compare magnitudes, the authorities do not rule out that it is one of the biggest disasters of these characteristics that have affected the country.
More than 130 fires were registered in 10 jurisdictions, and the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA) recorded 1,400,000 hectares in the affected provinces. This is more than 60 times the area of the City of Buenos Aires.
These are some of the shocking images of the fire:
Extreme weather (unusually high temperatures and little rain were being recorded throughout the country) was one of the factors that prevented fire brigades from bringing the fire under control.
At the end of last week, most of the outbreaks seemed controlled with the help of the drop in temperatures, but many were revived again.
At the same time that a large part of Argentina is on fire, another part is flooded (this is the case, for example, of the province of Santa Fe).
For this reason, it is inevitable to point out that climate change, on the one hand, and the forecasting of possible fires, on the other, are two factors that contributed to the catastrophe.
While the firefighters continue trying to put out the fire, the population laments the damage (both to agricultural production and to the natural heritage), and once again it is the planet that pays the consequences of the lack of awareness about climate change and neither take preventative measures in time.