Fact: Many fires at the beginning of summer
During May and June, many fires broke out in forests and land in Sweden.
Until June 13, MSB’s reinforcement resources for the municipalities’ rescue services had been activated 77 times, including with water-bombing helicopters and airplanes.
In the same period in 2022, they were activated 34 times.
SMHI’s map showing the risk of forest fires, which at the beginning of June glowed angry red, is now almost completely blue.
During the early summer’s heat wave, there was an extremely high risk of fire in large parts of the country – and there were warnings of another summer like the one in 2018.
But after an early summer with many fires, the situation has now calmed down.
“The risk of fire is small or very small in most places now in Sweden,” he says Stefan Anderssonmanager at the department for emergency services and accident prevention, at the Swedish Agency for Community Safety and Preparedness (MSB).
Worst on Gotland
While large parts of Europe are plagued by an extreme heat wave, the July weather in Sweden has been unsettled and rainy in large parts of the country.
Right now there is a fire ban in 17 of the country’s 290 municipalities – a sharp reduction since June. All of them are located in the far south of the east coast, an area that has not received very much rain.
— Therefore, the fire risk there is high or locally extremely high. For example, on Gotland, it is very dry in the vegetation and the deeper fuel layers, which means that there is a greater risk of fires that are more difficult to put out, says Stefan Andersson.
In the rest of Sweden, it looks all the calmer. As far as the forecast goes, the summer rain, with some sun between laps, looks set to remain.
Dark nights help
The fire risk later this summer depends entirely on how the weather develops.
— If we were to enter a drier period later this summer, there is of course a risk that it will become dry again and that the fire risk could include more parts of the country, says Linus Karlsson, meteorologist at SMHI.
But August’s longer and darker nights can save the day.
— This means that it gets more humid at night and in the mornings and thus reduces the window of time when forest fires are possible, says Stefan Andersson and adds:
— It has a dampening effect on the fires and is favorable from an extinguishing perspective.