In early 2020, during the first days of what would go on to be the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the rapid spread of the virus fought for headlines against, among other stories and problems that now seem impossibly distant in our collective memory of this long year, the dramatic and deadly Australian bushfire season. The fires in 2019 and 2020 were not the sorts of annual fires anticipated in the climatic social imagination of Australians, or for that matter, the world. From June of 2019 to May of 2020, over 45 million acres of land were burned and nearly 10,000 built structures were lost in the blazes. Researchers estimate that over 3 billion nonhuman animals were harmed or killed by the fires, and as a result several previously stable species are now endangered or facing extinction. A total of 34 people lost their lives directly to the fires, hundreds more from the long-term effects of smoke inhalation. Just as the bushfires in the Southern Hemisphere abated in May, wildfires in the North began to catch and spread, and by July California was in the midst of the most intense and widely distributed wildfire season in its modern history, with other Western states like Oregon and Washington also battling historic blazes. By November of 2020, 9 million acres had burned across California, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington, with human casualties and effects to wildlife similar to those connected to the fires in Australia.

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客座编辑对绿色犯罪学特刊的介绍

2020 年初，在新型冠状病毒 SARS-CoV-2 大流行的最初几天，病毒的迅速传播成为头条新闻，以及其他现在在我们的集体记忆中似乎遥不可及的故事和问题在这漫长的一年中，澳大利亚丛林大火的剧烈而致命的季节。2019 年和 2020 年的火灾并不是澳大利亚人或世界气候社会想象中预期的那种年度火灾。从 2019 年 6 月到 2020 年 5 月，超过 4500 万英亩的土地被烧毁，近 10,000 座建筑在大火中消失。研究人员估计，超过 30亿非人类动物在大火中受到伤害或死亡，因此一些以前稳定的物种现在濒临灭绝或面临灭绝。共有 34 人直接死于火灾，数百人因长期吸入烟雾而丧生。就像南半球的丛林大火在 5 月有所减弱一样，北部的野火开始蔓延并蔓延，到 7 月，加州正处于其现代历史上最激烈和分布最广的野火季节，其他西部州如俄勒冈州华盛顿也在与历史性的大火作斗争。到 2020 年 11 月，加州、科罗拉多州、俄勒冈州和华盛顿州已烧毁 900 万英亩土地，造成人员伤亡和对野生动物的影响，与澳大利亚大火有关。