It may be cold up there in the Arctic, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t burn. And as the planet gets warmer, tundra fires are not only becoming more common, they may also shift a huge amount of carbon from the soil into the atmosphere, a new study reports.

Back in 2007, lightning struck the remote North Slope of Alaska, igniting the largest fire to hit the region since modern recording began in the 1950s. The fire burned for nearly three months until snowfall finally put it out in October. It left behind a charred scar of 400 square miles - big enough to see from space.
A satellite image of the burn scar left by the Anaktuvuk River Fire. Source: NASA
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A satellite image of the burn scar left by the Anaktuvuk River Fire. Source: NASA

The fire didn’t get much press coverage in the lower 48 at the time, but it did catch the eye of ecologists studying the global carbon balance.

The 2007 fire, they found, sent as much stored carbon up in smoke as the entire arctic tundra stores in a year, researchers report in an article published yesterday in Nature.

Michelle Mack, a biologist from the University of […]