Steve Pyne
@sjpyne.bsky.social
Writer, fire guy (aka pyromantic), exploration historian, urban farmer. Recent books include "Pyrocene Park" and "Five Suns: A Fire History of Mexico." Website: www.stephenpyne.com
«Piroceno» presentado por su autor Stephen J. Pyne youtu.be/MiPo-yfDBUA * @sjpyne.bsky.social Piroceno Viejo y nuevo orden de los incendios forestales. Vivir en la Edad del Fuego Traducción del inglés de Salvador Cobo Coeditado con @biblioteca451.bsky.social www.pepitas.net/libro/piroceno
«El Piroceno es la nueva Edad del Fuego que está cambiando nuestros paisajes» #Reseña del libro de Stephen J. Pyne, «Piroceno», por Ricardo Estévez para @ecointeligencia.bsky.social www.ecointeligencia.com/2026/09/piro... * @sjpyne.bsky.social Piroceno www.pepitas.net/libro/piroceno
El Piroceno es la nueva Edad del Fuego que está cambiando nuestros paisajes - ecointeligencia
El Piroceno se enfoca en distinguir entre el fuego ecológicamente necesario, el fuego destructivo y la combustión industrial que altera el clima
ecointeligencia.com
Entrevista en El Mundo (España): www.elmundo.es/papel/histor...
Piroceno, la Edad de Fuego que domina el planeta: "Ver arder los pueblos es como ver regresar la peste"
Los incendios forestales ya no se parecen en casi nada a los incendios forestales. Ya no son una muralla de fuego que simplemente avanza sobre un terreno; ahora se han convertido...
elmundo.es
A mis colegas hispanohablantes - el editorial Pepitas ha publicado el piroceno en español. www.pepitas.net/libro/piroceno
Piroceno | Pepitas de calabaza
pepitas.net
A little comic relief - anyone remember the kid's book "Mr Pine's Mixed-up Signs"? I was told to make up a new batch for our urban farm...
What Talleyrand said of the Bourbon monarchy: they learn nothing and forget nothing. www.activenorcal.com/the-firefigh...
The Firefighting Rule America Abandoned 50 Years Ago Could Be Coming Back - Active NorCal
The 10 a.m. rule shaped a century of firefighting. Now Washington may revive it, and California's fire community is split.
activenorcal.com
My latest on the #wildfires burning across the Northern Hemisphere: time.com/article/2026... via TIME
What Happens When the World is on Fire
"From America to Algeria, dangerous blazes are occurring around the world, giving us a glimpse into an age ablaze," writes John Valliant.
time.com
Okay, I'm quoted in it, but this is still a good introduction to Europe's recent fires. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
Why Is Europe Burning?
“This is a structural issue in society,” a Spanish firefighter said, about worsening wildfires across Europe. “We’ve turned our backs on the mountains, on nature—and cities have never been so affected...
newyorker.com
Irresistible contrast - we don't need Deep Space Observatories looking out to the stars to understand Earth's status in the galaxy. We just need to look around us. Earth is the fire planet. None else like it. www.wired.com/story/spanis...
One of NASA’s Most Important Deep Space Observatories Hit by Spanish Wildfires
Flames burned through the Deep Space Communications Complex near Madrid, but NASA has been unable to assess the damage as a wildfire emergency grips the region.
wired.com
In 1928 Rene Magritte imagined the landscape on fire (Le Paysage en feu). A century later that ring of fire looks like a prophetic lens on Europe's Pyrocene.
Wildfire in southwestern France - not a new phenomenon, but not a welcome one either. Here's one of several fire paintings by Etienne Mondineu (ca. 1901).
A year ago the Dragon Bravo fire started (discovered on Fourth) - largest fire on record for the Kaibab Plateau and the ruination of the North Rim's developed area. The promised review is still not released. Anyone else think the agency is trying to just run out the clock?
Heat domes now, fires to follow. For historical background to Europe's fire scene, Undying Fire is published! 40% the length of Vestal Fire; half of it abridged and updated from VF, and half new and reconceptualized. Univ. of Washington Press even offers a 40% discount (code WAUT).
In recent decades 1998 has been season of record for the Southeast - looks like it's getting a challenger. The year was also noteworthy for the smoke that poured across the southern US from Mexico's 'temporada catastrofica' which led to major reforms in policy and programs.
Researching for a fire history of the Kaibab Plateau - my response to the Dragon Bravo fire -I found the jobs and pay for fed firefighters in 1946. You could be a legit flunky (paid more than an unskilled firefighter). Glad to see smokechasing as a distinctive category. Highest paid? Head cook.
If we all start thinking response is politicized (and I admit it sure looks like we are losing to the siege forces), if you demand that responders follow a party, it can do nothing but make disasters worse, response less effective, & recovery less equitable. Hands off Smokey. Free the Bear! 11/11
Tall Timbers was on the national register - a loss all around. I had the privilege of serving on the board for 3 years. Not just a place but an exemplar of fire and land management. wildfiretoday.com/fire-burns-h...
Fire burns historic building at key fire research complex – Wildfire Today
wildfiretoday.com
With Nebraska burning, it might be time to post some historic images of fire control on the Plains. Start with firebreaks installed in the Sandhills - double plowed lines with the interior burned out.
Before GIS there were fire atlases - all analogue, with printed topo maps, data entered with heavy colored pencils, hard bound in canvas. Here's one from the Kaibab National Forest that was rescued, scorched, from a fire in the supervisor's officer. A fire(d) atlas?
O'Connor is among the best journalists writing about fire. And the New Yorker? Who would have predicted it would regularly publish pieces on fire? Amazing fire, insightful essay. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
What America Can Learn from Its Largest Wildfire of the Year
When Dragon Bravo ignited, in Grand Canyon National Park, officials decided to let it burn. Then the fire spread out of control.
newyorker.com
As reports tally up the 2025 fires, here's a long view back. I've updated and abridged Vestal Fire - now 40% as long, with half the new text completely rewritten, reorganized, and reconceptualized. The narrative still includes Russia. Should be published in spring, 2026.
New paper: The role of fire on Earth doi.org/10.1093/bios... BioScience @aibsbiology.bsky.social Fire affects all major components of the Earth system: atmosphere, hydrosphere, geosphere, anthroposphere, & biosphere. Fire is an intrinsic factor on our planet. 🧪🌍🔥🌳🌿🌐 wildfire
Thread: August 20, the anniversary of the Big Blowup, a catalyst for the American way of wildland fire. (top) Post-season map of the 1910 season, with the Blowup circled in red. (bottom) Photo of the mine adit where ranger Ed Pulaski held his crew at gunpoint.
Shouldn't be a surprise - the fire practices of indigenous peoples in the highly fire-prone SW could locally override even climate signals. But that is what received understanding claimed. Here's the data to bring the Ndee into alignment with other premodern peoples. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Tree rings reveal persistent Western Apache (Ndee) fire stewardship and niche construction in the American Southwest | PNAS
Identifying the influence of low-density Indigenous populations in paleofire records has been methodologically challenging. In the Southwest United...
pnas.org
Thread. Yet another avatar for Dragon Bravo - burning an isolated mesa in the Canyon, this time The Dragon itself (one of the Canyon's most apt placenames).
Dragon Bravo keeps reincarnating - now it's a Canyon fire, sending a giant talon eastward from the Walhalla Plateau across the Canyon at its widest. Always had a Canyon fire or two each season, but - really?
In grad school I studied history of science, geomorphology, American West, and intellectual-cultural history, all aligning with the history of exploration, of which Great Ages makes a conceptual capstone. When I decided to write fire, my exploration stuff was my quasi-model. Just released in pb
Quite a summer for European fire. I'm reminded of a passage from A.C.Clarke's 2001: "Beyond the reaches of sea and land and air and space lay the realms of fire.." Not a bad account of the maturing Pyrocene. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...
Thousands in Greece and Turkey evacuate as winds and heat fan wildfires
Czech firefighters and Italian aircraft join rescue effort in Greece, and firefighter among those killed in Turkey
theguardian.com
Thread on Dragon Bravo, which continues its serial reincarnations. Began as lightning fire in confine and contain mode (escaped). Morphed into urban fire (incinerated park's developed area). Swelled into proto-megafire (blew over major containment line). Now a free-burning megafire.
