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Wildfires harry the Earth ’s surface , but they also interrupt the atmosphere , creating monstrous thunderstorms that come about surprisingly frequently , grant to newfangled research uncover Monday at this year ’s confluence of the American Geophysical Union in Brazil .

flaming - caused thunderstorms , call in pyrocumulonimbus tempest — pyrocbs ( pronounced PIE - row SEE - BEEs ) , for short — can inject hummer and other mote six to 10 miles ( 10 to 16 kilometers ) intothe atmosphere , far higher than most storm , which generally occur down in the mouth in the atmosphere , said Michael Fromm , a meteorologist at the Naval Research Lab in Washington , D.C.

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A pyrocumulonimbus looms. Seventeen of these fire-fueled storms happened in 2002 in Canada and the United States alone.

" We ’re chance that rules are a little dissimilar for pyrocbs , " Fromm told OurAmazingPlanet , " and we believe it ’s because they have heat muscularity associated with them that ’s equivalent to a minor volcanic eruption . "

In fact , Fromm allege , volcano have below the belt gotten some of the rap for particle seen in the low stratosphere when , in fact , wildfire - produced storms inject the material up into the region . The smoke and associated gases can remain in the atmosphere for many month , and are convey around the Earth by air currents .

With the exploitation of new analysis techniques of satellite datum , researchers were able to find what Fromm anticipate the " smoke gun " behind these tempest and their accompanying , richly - flying smoke .

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A pyrocumulonimbus looms. Seventeen of these fire-fueled storms happened in 2002 in Canada and the United States alone.

Just in the last few weeks , satellite data have indicated that the wildfires currently terrorizing Russia have bring on at least three of thesemassive electrical storm .

Fromm read a pyrocb can happen anywhere if the conditions are right . " It ’s less significant what is cut than how much is instantaneously fire — it could be grassland , forest , it could be a city , " he said .

If a fire burns intensely enough , one of these disadvantageously behaved tempest can forge .

A zoomed-in photo showing the gigantic jet up close

Fromm said the research is so new that scientists do n’t yet have models to anticipate how these violent storm may feign the climate as a whole . However , by looking back through twelvemonth of satellite information , Fromm said researchers can figure out if these monolithic storms are an increasing trend .

This article was offer byOurAmazingPlanet , a sister site to LiveScience .

A satellite photo of an island with a giant river of orange lava

a firefighter wearing gear stands on a hill looking out at a large wildfire

A satellite photo showing two bright red spots in a green landscape

colorful flashes of lightning can be seen among dense clouds

An image of the sun with solar wind coming off of it

The "wildfires" in this image are actually Orion�s Flame Nebula and its surroundings captured in radio waves. The image was taken with the ESO-operated Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX), located in Chile�s Atacama Desert.

High Park fire in the trees.

photo of the High Park Fire in Colorado taken June 10, 2012.

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The High Park Fire burning

Colorado�s High Park Fire

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A man with light skin and dark hair and beard leans back in a wooden boat, rowing with oars into the sea

an MRI scan of a brain

A photograph of two of Colossal�s genetically engineered wolves as pups.

an abstract image of intersecting lasers

Split image of an eye close up and the Tiangong Space Station.