With already 24 deaths and more than 12,000 infrastructures gone up in smoke, the incidence of the fires which have ravaged the surroundings of Los Angeles, California since January 7, is “absolutely considerable”, deplores Umair Irfan, reporter in the science department of the American media Vox. But Irfan also questions the media treatment of the event.
He first notes that “scientific coverage of disasters has improved a lot”. Journalists who cover these subjects “better understand the role of global warming and talk about it in their reports”, notes the journalist. Two days after the start of the fires, the editor-in-chief of Los Angeles Times indeed alerted its readers to the role of climate change in ongoing environmental disasters.
The Californian journalist states in particular that the fires which are shaking the region were started following a “hydroclimatic shock”, that is to say a sudden transition from a humid climate to extremely dry weather. Citing scientists, he explains that this climatic phenomenon would be a direct consequence of “human-caused climate change” and would increase the risk of fires.
Other media are more cautious. This is the case, for example, of New York Times, who, while recalling that “2024 was the hottest year on record”, note that it is “impossible at the moment to say with certainty” that the Los Angeles fires are “due to global warming”.
A precaution also adopted by Umair Irfan, who also notes that, due to lack of perspective on the scientific analysis of the current disaster, the subject quickly becomes political. The journalist of Vox cites for example the questions which followed the passage of Hurricane Milton in Florida in October 2024: “Which governor was responsible? Which political party was responsible for reconstruction?” Result, “the climate issue often ends up drowned in debates”, he concludes.
Related News :