Australia is facing an unprecedented national crisis. Around one billion animals including livestock, pets have been killed in the bushfires, which are tearing across rural areas and cities where at least 20 people have passed away and more than 1500 homes have been destroyed. The impact of bushfires has even been witnessed from the outer space through the images taken by NASA’s Suomi-NPP satellite, and other Earth-monitoring machines. Have a look at these before and after pictures which show the tragic impact of bushfires in Australia.
What’s In It?
The Kangaroo island housing unique, endangered wildlife has been badly affected due to the fires. Thousands of koalas have been killed and around 155,000 hectares of land has been left destroyed, which is one-third of the total island’s area. The Kangaroo Island Land for Wildlife organisation has eight sites on private land where species like bandicoots, echidnas, glossy black-cockatoos and dunnarts are protected.
Unfortunately, all the eight sites were extensively burned, so much so that even the camera used for monitoring, melted to oblivion. The fires have wiped out species of plants and animals entirely. And Kangaroo Island which housed endangered species have lost their fauna, and our hearts melt for them.
The administrative region, Canberra surrounded by New South Wales was witnessed the worst air quality and was even rated as the third-worst amongst major global cities recently. The weather forecast too predicts hot and dry conditions having strong winds and thunderstorms. It just increases the fire risk even further.
Also Read: Australia To Shoot 10,000 Camels Cause They Drink Too Much Water As A Solution To Bushfires
What’s More?
Experts suggest that fires which started naturally In Australia may have spread quickly due to human activity caused climate disruption. Estimate currently depict that the bushfire crisis has scorched and burnt down more than 14 million acres of land. Plumes of smoke roughly the area of Europe even darkened the skies of New Zealand and melted the glaciers there. Images taken from space even show the devastating impact that the Australian bushfires these were taken from NASA’s Suomi-NPP satellite and other Earth-monitoring machines by Japan Meteorological Agency’s Himawari-8 satellite.
With all these heartbreaking pictures, we sincerely hope and pray that these bushfires are put out soon. We have already lost a lot of unique, beautiful species to poaching, pollution and climate change. And every bit of flora and fauna makes this world a more beautiful place to live in. At this time, our prayers do go out to every individual and species in Australia. Did you know Smoke From Australian Bush Fires Has Turned New Zealand Glaciers Brown?