Canada wildfire totals explode to historic highs, US officials warn to extinguish fires ‘as fast as possible’

What began as a far-below-average wildfire season for Canada has since exploded past historical norms, causing national crews to mobilize and United States officials to issue warnings.

Area burned in Canada was less than half of the 10-year average on July 7, but just 10 days and over 300 wildfires later, area burned now sits at 2.78 million hectares (6.87 million acres), according to the National Wildland Fire Summary. The growing total is already 300,000 hectares (741,000 acres) above the 10-year average. The number of fires burning throughout Canada, at 3,656 as of July 17, is already above the 25-year average of 3,652 fires.

The fires have caused widespread hazardous air quality in the U.S. Midwest and Northeast. U.S. President Donald Trump and the Environmental Protection Agency both issued warnings on Friday, urging Canadian officials to “extinguish these fires as fast as possible.”

Credit: BC Wildfire Service

“We are holding Canada responsible for the fact that they are not properly sainting their forests, and Brush therein, and the United States is being unnecessarily invaded by filthy, polluted, and unhealthy air, the quality of which is dangerous, and totally unacceptable,” Trump said in a social media post. “I will call the Prime Minister during the day to find out what they are going to do about it.”

Fire danger is extreme in Ontario, with widespread wildfires causing evacuations in numerous communities across the province, according to Canada’s most recent fire summary. Fires are forecast to continue growing over the coming days due to high temperatures, dry weather and lightning.

The Northwest Territories and parts of Nunavut are also nearing extreme fire danger, while northern Manitoba, north-central Saskatchewan, and interior British Columbia’s fire danger are also expected to increase.

Wildfire smoke impacts are also expected to continue in both eastern Canada and the U.S. over the coming days, specifically due to heavy smoke emitted by fires in western Ontario. Canadian officials said diplomatic engagement is being coordinated to discuss smoke impacts on U.S. states.

Wildfire risk elevated throughout the Western US during July Fourth weekend

Widespread extreme heat and critically dry vegetation nationwide prompted experts to issue multiple fuels and fire behavior advisories throughout the July 4 weekend. Forecasters don’t expect relief anytime soon.

The National Interagency Fire Center has two active advisories, which are only issued during extreme circumstances that pose elevated threats to firefighters or public safety, for vast areas of the country, including:

One of the fires burning in the advisory area, the Snyder Mesa Fire, has burned over 30,000 acres and caused the deaths of three wildland firefighters earlier this week. It currently sits at 65% containment as of Friday, but wildfire officials said there’s an elevated risk of the fire breaching containment due to observed extreme fire spread, critically dry fuels, and drought-stressed brush and trees.

“Fuel conditions across the Geographic Area are significantly drier and more volatile than normal for late-June,” the NIFC’s advisory said. “Prolonged heat, low humidity, and steady winds have rapidly dried out live and dead fuels, especially native grasses, trees/brush, and 1000-hour fuels. In most of Colorado and a good part of Southern Wyoming, moisture levels are nearing or exceeding historic lows, triggering fire behavior seen only during the driest and
most severe fire seasons.”

Apart from the risk of fireworks igniting wildfires, forecasters also warned about elevated fire risk due to strong gusts in the Greater Four Corners region and isolated dry thunderstorms developing in both Wyoming and portions of New Mexico and Texas. A warming trend in the western U.S. also sets up high fire probability, along with record-high temperatures throughout the East Coast.

Identities of firefighters killed by burnover near Colorado-Utah border released

The names of the three wildland firefighters killed during a burnover event near the Colorado-Utah border on Saturday were released by the Department of the Interior on Monday.

The firefighters were identified as:

  • Emily Barker, 38, of Clinton Township, Michigan, assigned to the U.S. Forest Service Rifle Helitack. 
  • Nick Hutcherson, 27, of Glendale, Arizona, assigned to the U.S. Forest Service Kaibab National Forest. 
  • Sydney Watson, 27, of Warrior, Alabama, assigned to the U.S. Wildland Fire Service Rifle Helitack.
From left to right: Emily Barker, Nick Hutcherson and Sydney Watson. Credit: Department of the Interior.

Officials did not release the identities of the two firefighters hospitalized with burns. The agencies have mobilized a serious accident investigation team to review the circumstances leading up to the incident, officials said.

The Knowles and Gore fires, which the Rifle Helitack crew was originally assigned to, were overtaken by the Snyder Mesa Fire after it merged with the Jones Fire, the U.S. Wildland Fire Service said in a press release on Monday. An interagency complex incident management team has since assumed command.

“We mourn the loss of three firefighters who answered the call to protect others and made the ultimate sacrifice in service to their fellow citizens,” U.S. Wildland Fire Service Chief Brian Fennessy said in the release. “Our thoughts are with their families, loved ones, friends and crewmates as they face an unimaginable loss. These firefighters embodied the courage, professionalism and selflessness that define the wildland fire service.”

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Burnover kills 3 firefighters and injures 2 near Colorado-Utah border, Wildland Fire Service’s first fatalities

Our sincere condolences go out to the families, friends, and co-workers of the victims and the injured.

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Burnover kills 3 firefighters and injures 2 near Colorado-Utah border, Wildland Fire Service’s first fatalities

The U.S. Wildland Fire Service announced the deaths of three firefighters early Sunday morning after a burnover event near the Colorado-Utah border.

Service officials said crews were responding to wildfires in western Colorado on Saturday when firefighters became trapped and flames overtook them. Two firefighters survived and are being treated for burns, while three others succumbed to their injuries. The identities of those killed and injured are being withheld until family members are notified.

The deaths are the Service’s first fatalities since the Department of the Interior consolidated all of its wildland firefighting forces into a single agency. The Service did not release details of the operational events leading up to the burnover, with officials saying additional information would be released later.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: US Wildland Fire Service partially funded from significant EPA cuts

“The U.S. Wildland Fire Service and the U.S. Forest Service are focused on supporting the firefighters’ family, friends and colleagues during this difficult time,” officials said in the press release.

The firefighters were assigned to the Knowles and Gore fires, which have since combined with the nearby Jones and Snyder fires into what local officials are calling the Snyder Mesa Fire. The combined fires have burned nearly 29,000 acres as of Sunday morning and have triggered an emergency declaration from Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, which activated the state’s Emergency Operations Plan and authorizes the support of the Colorado National Guard.

“This support includes State and interagency engines and handcrews, DFPC and interagency aviation resources, and incident management personnel and overhead to assist in management of the fire and containment efforts,” Polis said. “In addition, DFPC is supporting Mesa County and the incident with administrative and financial oversight and intelligence products that include imaging, mapping, and fire behavior modeling and projects.”

The Mesa County Sheriff’s Office and the American Red Cross established an evacuation resource center in the former Faith Heights Church located at 600 28 ¼ Road in Grand Junction, Colorado.

USFS allows N95 mask use for wildland firefighters

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service announced on Wednesday that it has authorized wildland firefighters to use N95 respirators on the fire line.

A breathing apparatus or mask like an N95 hasn’t historically been a staple of wildland firefighters’ gear, though some have been in testing for years. The added carry capacity is one reason, along with the assumed lack of toxic chemical inhalation, since the fire burns in a natural area free from synthetic materials.

But research has since found that assumption isn’t true. Wildfire can create cancer-causing toxic heavy metals depending on where they burn and the severity of the flames.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Wildfire smoke toxicity worsened by heavy metals in soil, flame intensity

Reducing such hazardous exposure to wildland firefighters was the major reason for the Service’s announcement, according to a press release sent out by officials.

“Secretary Rollins has made it clear that we will no longer stand by as firefighters face long-term health risks just from doing their job,” said Forest Service Deputy Chief of Fire and Aviation Management Sarah Fisher in the release. “The action we are taking today is about doing right by the people who put themselves between our communities and escalating wildfire threats. Improving respiratory safety and expanding decontamination practices are practical, common-sense measures that will make a real difference on the ground.”

The authorization allows N95 use and requires training and standardized decontamination protocols, like mandatory showers, gear cleaning and clean-air recovery, which are compliant with Occupational Safety and Health Administration requirements.

“Firefighters who are healthy, informed, and supported are better positioned to do their jobs effectively and safely,” officials said in the press release. “The Forest Service is committed to that outcome and will continue to advance improved health protection measures with the Department of the Interior.”

Click here to read the full release.

Significant wildfire activity heading into Juneteenth weekend drives National Preparedness Level increase

The National Interagency Fire Center increased the National Preparedness Level to PL3 on Thursday, marking a shift toward needed national support as the U.S. nears peak fire season.

The increase was driven by significant wildland fire activity across the country, with the potential of additional large fires remaining elevated in the days ahead, the NIFC said. Nearly 5,000 personnel are actively assigned to fires nationwide,

Over 33,000 fires have been reported and 2.6 million acres burned so far in 2026, far above the 10-year average year-to-date of 24,685 fires and 1.6 million acres burned.

“While current resource capability remains sufficient to sustain incident operations, geographic areas are increasingly utilizing national support to accomplish incident management objectives,” the Center said in its latest update. “The increase reflects growing demand for firefighting resources and heightened fire potential across several regions of the country.”

Fire activity is largely concentrated across the Northwest, Great Basin, Southwest and Rocky Mountain areas, Center officials said. Severe large fires recently triggered evacuations and threatened structures in both Washington and Oregon. New fires in Idaho, Nevada, Arizona and Nebraska are also rapidly growing.

Fire risk remains elevated throughout the western third of the U.S. due to persistent triple-digit heat, single-digit relative humidity, and breezy conditions, according to the Center’s report. Incoming thunderstorms with only spotty rainfall also heighten wildfire risk over the northern Sierra, southeast Arizona, southern New Mexico, and west Texas.

“Unprecedented” snow drought and record-low water shortages are expected ahead of what is forecast to be a very active fire season, according to federal officials.

“Many of the rivers are likely to experience well-below median streamflows, which may rival the lowest flows on record for the region,” the Service said in the Department’s most recent Water and Climate Update. “Water shortages are anticipated in many locations, especially for entities that rely on surface streamflow water, without the benefit of having access to stored reservoir water.”

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Record-low water shortages expected ahead of very active US wildfire season

Linking wildfire risk to social vulnerability

Socially vulnerable groups are significantly over-represented in high wildfire-risk areas across the United States and should be prioritized for targeted mitigation measures, research has found.

A study in the International Journal of Wildland Fire identified census tracts across the US where high wildfire risk and high social vulnerability intersect – and found that American Indian/Alaska Native communities, Hispanic/Latino residents, and mobile home residents are disproportionately concentrated in these areas.

Most of these tracts are located in less populated areas of western and southern states, and concentrated mainly in California, Texas, and Florida.

Exploring the spatial association between wildfire risk and social vulnerability in continental US, International Journal of Wildland Fire.
Exploring the spatial association between wildfire risk and social vulnerability in continental US, International Journal of Wildland Fire.

With nearly 21 million people living in these high-risk, high-vulnerability zones, this research has implications for wildfire mitigation and disaster preparedness, particularly for communities that have historically been underserved.

This is not the first study to make the connection – lead author Professor Jayajit Chakraborty from the University of California, Santa Barbara, explains that we have known for a while that vulnerable communities bear a disproportionate burden from wildfires.

“What we are doing differently is asking where exactly does this happen and using rigorous spatial statistics to answer that,” said Prof Chakraborty.

The study overlaid a number of databases and analytical tools to get the result – mainly, the bivariate Local Indicators of Spatial Associations (LISA), and the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) that was developed by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to map areas of vulnerability for public health and emergency planners.

The use of LISA at a national scale provided spatial precision. “Previous studies have documented the relationship but had not really pinned down the specific neighborhoods where high wildfire risk and high social vulnerability coincide spatially. That’s the gap we were trying to fill”

So, what does a more precise approach for these communities actually look like? It really depends on the community, Prof Chakraborty says.

“For Indigenous communities, for example, it’s not just about dropping fire mitigation resources in – it’s about meaningful consultation, respecting tribal governance, and supporting things like culturally grounded prescribed burn programs that many tribes have practiced for generations.

“For Hispanic communities, a lot of it comes down to language access and trust issues. Evacuation notices that only exist in English, or disaster relief programs that exclude undocumented residents – these are fixable barriers.

“For mobile home residents, the needs are more physical – these homes are genuinely more fire-vulnerable, and their residents often don’t have the financial resources to make improvements on their own, so you are looking at approaches like subsidized retrofitting or community-level preparedness programs.

“The broader point here is that the High–High tracts identified in this study essentially provide a spatial targeting layer — agencies and decisionmakers can overlay this map with existing program boundaries identify gaps and prioritize investments in overburdened communities.

But how do we explain the LA fires of 2025 that burnt into some of the most expensive real estate in the country?

“The rich can be exposed to wildfire, but they are not socially vulnerable to it in the same way. The findings from our IJWF article show it is American Indian, Hispanic, and mobile home communities – disproportionately in rural western and southern areas – who face the combined burden of high risk and low adaptive capacity,” said Prof Chakraborty.

“The LA fires were a high-visibility event in an economically affluent area; the communities our research identifies face similar or greater physical risk with far fewer resources to prepare, respond, or recover.”

Read the full research paper by Professor Jayajit Chakraborty and Masters Student Sara Soroka in the International Journal of Wildland Fire.

Wildfire Prevention Act becomes ‘Trojan Horse’ for Roadless Rule repeal

Support for a once bipartisan piece of wildfire-focused legislation has faltered after Republican lawmakers added a repeal of the Roadless Rule.

Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) proposed the amendment to the Wildfire Prevention Act, which would increase fuels treatments in federal forests and had support from both Democrats and Republicans before the amendment. The nullification of the rule dissolved that support.

The “Roadless Rule” prohibits new road construction and intensive logging in millions of acres of federal forest. The Trump administration has been targeting the rule for years, with the current Forest Service leadership announcing a draft proposal to rescind it in June 2025.

The inclusion of the Roadless Rule’s repeal triggered criticism from Democratic senators on the committee, with Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) saying the bill had become a “Trojan Horse” for the repeal.

“We took a previously, largely bipartisan, constructive wildfire effort, and now it has become a partisan pitched battle over repealing roadless areas,” Heinrich said. “That is a poster child for how not to get successful legislation done, and I am disappointed.”

Lee previously called the Roadless Rule an “environmental disaster” and claimed the rule hampers forest thinning and fire prevention. But the rule’s text does allow prescribed burning and fuel treatments.

The Wildfire Prevention Act passed the committee along party lines, 11-9, but Democratic lawmakers said the inclusion of the repeal guarantees the larger bill’s failure.

Numerous environment-focused organizations immediately condemned the repeal’s inclusion in the Wildfire Prevention Act, including Environment America, the National Wildlife Federation, the Sierra Club, the BlueRibbon Coalition, and the Defenders of Wildlife. The major proponents of the Roadless Rule’s repeal are timber associations, which said the rule is based on false and unscientific premises.

Research has repeatedly found that ending the roadless rule would likely make wildfires more common, rather than reducing the fires.

READ MORE: End to landmark roadless rule will make wildfires more likely

Elevated fire weather forecasted throughout the US this week

The “very active” fire season predicted for the U.S. since the beginning of the year may largely kick off this week, according to forecasts from the National Interagency Fire Center.

Elevated fire weather conditions are set across the Southwest and southern Great Basin regions due to strong winds, dry conditions and very warm temperatures, according to the Center’s forecasts. Much of the Southwest, Great Basin, and far north are expected to experience significant wildland fire potential throughout June, according to the Center’s outlooks.

Much of Arizona, Utah and southeast Nevada specifically are at high risk of wildfire ignitions this week, mainly due to windy conditions, data from the Center’s daily forecasts showed.

“Minimum relative humidity will fall to 5-15% across Arizona, Utah, and Nevada, with southwest winds 10-20 mph and gusts to 30-35 mph across exposed terrain and ridges, with the strongest winds in southern Nevada, southwest Utah, and northwest Arizona,” Center officials said.

Wildfire crews have already been busier than usual this year. More than 31,511 fires have burned almost 2.5 million acres nationwide, which are above the 10-year averages of 22,270 fires and 1.27 million acres, according to the Center.

Credit: NIFC

Peak wildfire season nears as Western states are expected to face water shortages due to extremely low streamflows throughout the spring, according to the U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service.

“Many of the rivers are likely to experience well-below median streamflows, which may rival the lowest flows on record for the region,” the Service said in a previous Water and Climate Update. “Water shortages are anticipated in many locations, especially for entities that rely on surface streamflow water, without the benefit of having access to stored reservoir water.”

PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Record-low water shortages expected ahead of very active US wildfire season

The low streamflows were blamed primarily on record-low snowpack during the winter months, which also melted weeks earlier than normal. The “unprecedented” snowpack levels were the lowest in 40 years, and researchers said the only way extreme fire chances could be reduced was through a “major switch” in circulation patterns. So far, there’s nothing in season forecasts or weather models that indicate such a switch is on its way.

US Wildland Fire Service partially funded from significant EPA cuts

It’s been nearly half a year since the U.S. Wildland Fire Service was formally launched, but the new agency has gone without funding since. Lawmakers may soon change that.

The U.S. House Committee on Appropriations submitted its funding plan for the Department of the Interior, the environment and related agencies this week, with a specific focus on the fire service. Lawmakers said the funding was in line with the Trump Administration’s proposal to unify the DoI’s firefighting activities.

The nearly $1.2 billion in proposed funding for the Wildland Fire Service is a fraction of the original $6.5 billion proposed for the service in the 2026 appropriations act, which was blocked by a bipartisan group of Senators. Lawmakers were allegedly only able to get the $1.2 billion by significantly cutting the funding of the Environmental Protection Agency.

“In order to fund these priorities at necessary levels, the Committee has reduced funding for the majority of accounts in the bill,” lawmakers said in their funding report. “This includes a reduction of $1,781,584,000, or 20 percent, reduction to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) below the fiscal year 2026 enacted level.”

The Republican and Democratic Senators who previously blocked the funding said they couldn’t endorse the consolidation of federal wildland firefighting forces from both the Department of the Interior and the U.S. Forest Service, which manages more than two-thirds of the nation’s firefighting resources, into a single agency. They said such a combination of resources could only be approved by an act of Congress, and ordered the agency to conduct a study on the feasibility of such a consolidation.

The House Committee’s members acknowledged the study, and said the Trump Administration is in the process of contracting with an independent research organization to complete the study.

The funding proposal addressed numerous other wildland fire subjects, including:

  • $2.6 billion for wildland fire management under the U.S. Forest Service.
  • $185 million for hazardous fuels management activities, including $18 million for the Community Wood Energy Program’s sawmilling equipment.
  • $5 million for forest restoration and seedling replanting activities, specifically in the Pacific Region.
  • $3 million for Wildland Urban Interface fire research.
  • $2.5 million for purchasing generators for Tribal Health Programs to mitigate issues for de-energization protocols during wildfires.
  • $1.6 million to the Forest Service for AI wildfire modeling research near the National Interagency Fire Center.

Click here to read the full report and the full funding bill.