{"id":20347,"date":"2026-05-12T19:22:21","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T19:22:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/the-super-el-nino-threat-its-only-may-but-2026-has-already-broken-every-wildfire-record\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T19:22:21","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T19:22:21","slug":"the-super-el-nino-threat-its-only-may-but-2026-has-already-broken-every-wildfire-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/the-super-el-nino-threat-its-only-may-but-2026-has-already-broken-every-wildfire-record\/","title":{"rendered":"The \u2018Super El Nino\u2019 threat: It\u2019s only May but 2026 has already broken every wildfire record"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
<\/div>\n

PARIS, May 12 — The world could face a year of “particularly severe” wildfires, fuelled by climate change and a potentially strong El Nino weather phenomenon, after a record-breaking start to 2026, researchers warned Tuesday.<\/p>\n

“This year the global fire season has got off to a very fast start,” said Theodore Keeping, a researcher at Imperial College London.<\/p>\n

The area scorched by wildfires so far is 50 per cent higher than average for this time of year, Keeping said in a press briefing.<\/p>\n

And this is before El Nino has even formed.<\/p>\n

El Nino is the warm phase of a natural climate cycle in Pacific Ocean temperatures and trade winds, which influences global weather patterns and increases the likelihood of droughts, heavy rainfall and other climate extremes.<\/p>\n

It also adds heat to a planet already warmed from burning fossil fuels. The last El Nino helped make 2023 and 2024 the top two hottest years on record.<\/p>\n

News :<\/span><div>12 weeks' jail for school IT support technician who took upskirt videos of teachers<\/div><\/span><\/a><\/div>

Some weather agencies forecast the coming event will be even stronger – possibly rivalling a “super” El Nino three decades ago.<\/p>\n

“The likelihood of harmful extreme fires potentially could be the highest we’ve seen in recent history if a strong El Nino does develop,” said Keeping, who is part of World Weather Attribution (WWA), a network of climate scientists.<\/p>\n

Fires have already burnt a total area exceeding 163 million hectares between January and the first week of May, according to data from the Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS).<\/p>\n

The total burnt area is around 20 per cent higher than the previous record since global tracking began in 2012, Keeping said.<\/p>\n

Records were broken in several countries in west Africa and the Sahel region, as well as Sudan and South Sudan, he said.<\/p>\n

The burnt area from Asian wildfires has thus far been nearly 40 per cent larger than the previous record in 2014, Keeping added.<\/p>\n

News :<\/span>Migrant acquitted in first trial over US border military zones<\/span><\/a><\/div>

The United States and Australia have also seen unseasonably large areas burnt this year.<\/p>\n

WWA co-founder Friederike Otto, a climate science professor at Imperial College London, also warned that “there is a serious risk” that the combination of climate change and El Nino could result in “unprecedented weather extremes” this year.<\/p>\n

But she said El Nino is “not the reason to freak out” as it is a natural weather phenomenon that “comes and goes”.<\/p>\n

“Climate change is the reason to freak out,” she said, as “it gets worse and worse and worse.” — AFP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The ‘Super El Nino’ threat: It’s only May but 2026 has already broken every wildfire record<\/sub><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PARIS, May 12 — The world could face a year of “particularly severe” wildfires, fuelled by climate change and a potentially strong El Nino weather phenomenon, after a record-breaking start to 2026, researchers warned Tuesday. “This year the global fire season has got off to a very fast start,” said Theodore Keeping, a researcher at…<\/p>\n

Read More “The \u2018Super El Nino\u2019 threat: It\u2019s only May but 2026 has already broken every wildfire record”<\/span> »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20348,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20347\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}