An out-of-control fire was advancing rapidly toward a logging road on Tuesday afternoon, tearing through Canada’s immense — and highly flammable — boreal forest with a force and intensity bewildering to a team of French firefighters.
Surrounded by thick smoke, a handful of them headed into the forest to search for water.
A veteran knelt down and used his right finger to sketch a plan on the gravel road, pressing to attack the fire head-on.
The fire, he said, was of an immensity unimaginable in France.
Trying to douse this tiny patch would be “pointless.”
Locations:
France