©BC Wildfire Service

To the thousands forced to flee their homes in British Columbia’s normally idyllic Okanagan Valley, the wildfire that quickly consumed large tracts of the area this weekend was a regional disaster. But to John Vaillant …the blaze is one piece of a much larger crisis that this year has enveloped large parts of Canada, the United States, Spain, France and Greece, and is worsening. …There’s a universal recipe for wildfires, regardless of their location: Dry vegetation for fuel; lightning or a human-caused source of ignition; and hot, dry, windy weather, said Dr. Mike Flannigan, at Thompson Rivers University. All converged to form the blaze in the Okanagan, he said. …Some of the Okanagan region’s active fires… have ignited on burn scars from past wildfires – which should be unsurprising to policy-makers, said fire ecologist Robert Gray. …Without regular prescribed burns… wildfires will keep igniting in scarred areas, said Mr. Gray. [A Globe and Mail subscription is required for full access]