The Gatlinburg, Tennessee, forest fire this week, along with the Fort McMurray fire last summer were both high profile fires because they burned cities.
Huge fires are relatively common in northern Canada, where summer rainfall tends to be light, leaving the boreal forest tinder-dry. The fire caused the massive evacuation out of Fort McMurray just happened to start near a large city. The Gatlinburg fire happened in the southern Appalachians, where large fires are less common. However, the drought there this fall has been extreme.
Some claim these fires are becoming more frequent due to increasing drought threat from Climate Change. This threat is certainly possible. There is considerable current research that suggests an increasing drought threat. But a lot of the attention these fires have created is due to the fact that they happened in populated areas. Such things have happened before. An estimated 2,500 people were killed in a flash forest fire in Peshtigo, Wisconsin, in 1871. That was the same day as the more famous Chicago fire.
