New age of fire activity: The perfect storm that set Hawaii ablaze could happen almost anywhere

Smoke rises from a burned forest north of Athens. The EU sent more aircraft to help Greek firefighters contain the nation’s largest wildfires on record. Photo: dpa/Angelos Tzortzinis

Ash-covered cars still line the highway in Hawaii, where hundreds of people recently tried in vain to escape from a fast-moving and fatal wildfire, like a scene out of a nightmare.

In Canada, raging fires burned through more than 30 million acres (12 million ha) of boreal forests, spewing noxious smoke and choking nearby communities with some of the worst air quality on Earth.