美国国家公共电台 NPR--Climate change is increasing the fire risk on the mostly treeless Great Plains

Climate change is increasing the fire risk on the mostly treeless Great Plains

Transcript¹

The Great Plains are facing increasing fire risks due to climate change, and efforts are underway to get prairie-dwellers² to adapt to the new reality.

A MART?NEZ, HOST:

Climate change is increasing the fire risk on the mostly treeless Great Plains. Montana Public Radio's Aaron Bolton reports on efforts to get prairie dwellers to adapt to the new reality.

AARON BOLTON, BYLINE³: Homebuilder Josh Poser lives in the small town of Denton, surrounded by the grasslands⁴ of eastern Montana. The last thing he thought he'd be doing is fighting a wildfire in December, but that's exactly what happened a couple of years ago as 70-mile-an-hour winds pushed flames across 10,000 acres.

JOSH POSER: Late that night, you know, we're putting some embers out in the yard and sprinkler on the roof, and they had patrols going all over the place.

BOLTON: Overnight, flames consumed Poser's house and 24 others. Don Pyrah is with Montana's state fire agency. He says firefighters were quickly overwhelmed because, unusually, there was no snow on the ground in December, and it was way too warm.

DON PYRAH: And it was 56 degrees in the middle of the night. That's not normal.

BOLTON: Researchers say the warming climate means more dry Decembers and a lot less snow cover across the Great Plains, meaning a lot more fire risk during a typically windier time of the year. University of Florida researcher Victoria Donovan led a 2017 study that found fire activity on the Great Plains has increased by 3 1/2 times in recent decades. She says that a century of fire suppression has also allowed more trees and woody vegetation to grow, making fires more intense.

VICTORIA DONOVAN: There's a lot more opportunities for these wildfires to occur and also for them to be a lot more destructive.

BOLTON: That kind of research isn't really embraced in conservative eastern Montana. Official growth policy in the county that had the big fire explicitly⁵ opposes President Biden's 2021 executive order on climate change. Mike DeVries is chief of the volunteer fire department in Denton, the town of 200 that was burned over a couple of Decembers ago.

MIKE DEVRIES: I mean, I grew up in Montana, and I know we've been through droughts. I don't know that people just attribute it to one thing.

BOLTON: But DeVries acknowledges that fire was well outside the norm.

DEVRIES: That was by far the most active and unbelievable year that we'd ever had.

BOLTON: Anika Peila with Montana's state fire agency is trying to help people better prepare their homes for fires. She says it's a tougher sell out here than in more forested parts of the state.

ANIKA PEILA: You can blame climate change, the drought, whatever you want to blame, but it ultimately starts with people's homes.

BOLTON: Peila will make suggestions for property owners, like shifting to metal roofs and less flammable building materials or cutting back trees and shrubs⁶ near their home. But there's been little interest so far.

PEILA: I feel like that's people's beauty. That's people's paradise.

BOLTON: But Josh Poser, who lost his house in the December fire, is still living with his family in a camper. He takes the threat of another wildfire more seriously now. Standing⁷ inside the unfinished walls of the new home he hopes to finish this fall, he says they are building in a more fire-resilient way to avoid losing their home again.

POSER: There will be concrete siding, metal roof. Before, we had - everything was wood - wood windows, wood siding, wood everything. So it was a recipe for disaster.

BOLTON: Those are exactly the kind of changes state fire managers would like to see more people in the Great Plains make. They're hoping others will be more likely to do the same if they see their neighbor do it first.

For NPR News, I'm Aaron Bolton in Denton, Mont.

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1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 dwellers   

n.居民，居住者( dweller的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City dwellers think country folk have provincial attitudes. 城里人以为乡下人思想迂腐。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They have transformed themselves into permanent city dwellers. 他们已成为永久的城市居民。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 grasslands   

n.草原，牧场( grassland的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Songs were heard ringing loud and clear over the grasslands. 草原上扬起清亮激越的歌声。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• Grasslands have been broken and planted to wheat. 草原已经开垦出来，种上了小麦。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 explicitly   

ad.明确地，显然地

参考例句：

• The plan does not explicitly endorse the private ownership of land. 该计划没有明确地支持土地私有制。
• SARA amended section 113 to provide explicitly for a right to contribution. 《最高基金修正与再授权法案》修正了第123条，清楚地规定了分配权。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

6 shrubs   

灌木( shrub的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The gardener spent a complete morning in trimming those two shrubs. 园丁花了整个上午的时间修剪那两处灌木林。
• These shrubs will need more light to produce flowering shoots. 这些灌木需要更多的光照才能抽出开花的新枝。

7 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。