1988 fires in Yellowstone and the West were harbingers of things to come

…Only the snows of November would put out the fires after they had burned through 1 million acres in and around Yellowstone. You might call the 1988 fires in Yellowstone and across the Northern Rockies “signal fires.”

They signaled that we would live in a different world in the American West at the beginning of the 21st century. The fires and ecological processes we assumed were natural had already fallen under the influence of our civilization’s dependence on fossil fuels. The 1988 fires also signaled that our world was getting drier and hotter. The drought that year across North America was the worst since the 1930s.

In the former Dust Bowl states from Montana to Nebraska, Kansas and Texas, farmers reported dark clouds of dust again as their topsoil blew away. By June 1, the Soil Conservation Service estimated that 12 million acres had already been damaged by wind erosion.

Record temperatures hit cities across the country. American companies sold 4 million air conditioners and could not keep up with demand.

James Hansen, then an obscure NASA climatologist, warned Congress for the first time that there was clear evidence that greenhouse gases were increasing in the atmosphere and warming the globe.

Across the West, 6 million acres burned, the most since the federal agencies began keeping good records in 1960. Twenty years later, years like 1988 have become the norm. Even former climate change skeptics acknowledge today that the climate is changing and has been changing for a while.

Salt Lake Tribune