26-03-2025
Recent spate of wildfires in Japan and South Korea linked to climate change
A series of wildfires that broke out in Japan and South Korea last week were fueled by human-induced climate change, according to a new rapid analysis released by a group of European researchers.
ClimaMeter, a European Union-backed project studying the impact of climate change on extreme weather, said the ongoing wildfires in both countries were made more intense due to persistently dry soil, strong winds and unusually high temperatures.
The wildfires erupted between Friday and Sunday and are still raging in Okayama and Ehime prefectures in Japan, as well as in parts of South Korea .
Meanwhile, a new wildfire detected in the city of Miyazaki around noon on Tuesday continued to spread on Wednesday despite efforts by local firefighters and Self-Defense Forces to tame the blaze. The fire had razed 50 hectares as of Wednesday morning and at least 70 households in the city have been told to evacuate.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Wednesday issued an order to ministers and relevant authorities to maximize efforts to put out the fires, support residents' safe evacuation and get trucks mounted with electric generators ready in case of large-scale power outages.
In the European study, researchers compared patterns of the atmospheric pressure system of 1987-2023 with those of the 1950-1986 period, when they were less affected by climate change. The results showed that the weather in the latest period was warmer by up to 2 degrees Celsius, precipitation was down by up to 2 millimeters per day and winds were stronger by up to 4.8 kph.
The wildfires in the past week follow the nation's worst wildfire in half a century , which broke out in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture in February, right on the heels of record snowfall observed the same month in eastern and northern Japan .
'In weeks, the region saw record snowfall and the worst fire in decades,' said Davide Faranda, a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, who was involved in the study.
'Climate change isn't just warming the planet, it is amplifying extremes of different nature, fueling disasters from both fire and ice in the region.'
Carmen Alvarez Castro, a researcher at the University Pablo de Olavide in Spain who was also involved in the study, concurred.
'The wildfires in eastern Asia in March 2025, strengthened by human-driven climate change, underscore the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events, stressing the urgent need to tackle the rising impacts of climate change,' she said.
In their analysis, the researchers factored in different natural phenomena such as El Nino and concluded that, while some of these changes can be caused by natural variability, contributions by human-driven climate change was undeniable.
While an average of 1,300 wildfires strike Japan every year, this year has seen a spate of events that are much worse than most. In addition to the Ofunato wildfire, which razed 2,900 hectares of vegetation, a forest fire in Imabari, Ehime Prefecture continues to rage at the time of writing, having spread some 300 hectares. The city has ordered a total of 3,800 households to evacuate from their homes.
Firefighting efforts were also ongoing in the city of Okayama, where 546 hectares had been burnt down as of 2 p.m. Wednesday.
