Human Geography

Charting the rise and fall of great sea powers

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 18 Sep 2025 17:29:31 +0000

Charting the rise and fall of great sea powers Rachel Sauer Thu, 09/18/2025 - 11:29

Bradley Worrell

CU alum’s book examines how the fate of the Netherlands, Great Britain and the United States as economic and political powers has been deeply intertwined with their ability to project power via the seas

Colin Flint, a 51�Թ�� PhD geography graduate and professor of political geography at Utah State University, researches the rise and fall of great world powers.

It’s a topic beyond simple academic interest to Flint, who was born in 1965 and raised in England during a period of seismic change in the country.

“At the time, Britain was still struggling to figure out that it wasn’t the world’s greatest power anymore, so my socialization and political coming of age was in a declined power,” he says. Additionally, Flint says being raised in the busy ferry port of Dover made a powerful impression on him by highlighting the country’s long history as a maritime nation.

Colin Flint, a 51�Թ�� PhD geography graduate, researches the rise and fall of great world powers.

“Dover definitely has influenced me, being so close to the water,” he says. “My high school was on a hill overlooking the harbor, which at the time was the busiest ferry port in the world, with ships going back and forth to France and Belgium. So, the notion was very much rooted in me that Britain drew its power, historically, from the sea.”

At one point, Flint entertained the idea of joining the Royal Navy before setting his career sights on academia. He obtained his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Britain, then pursued his PhD in geography at the 51�Թ�� thanks to fortuitous connections between his undergrad mentor and 51�Թ�� Department of Geography Professor John O’Loughlin.

“I moved to United States of America in 1990 to attend university, and the literature at the time and discussions were all very declinist. It was very much, ‘America has gone down the tubes,’” he says. “Broadly speaking, I moved from a declined power into a declining power, or so I thought at the time.”

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Flint says the idea of America as a declining power was largely replaced with a triumphalist narrative that saw the U.S. as the world’s only remaining superpower.

Ideas about what makes a country an economic and political superpower—and how a country can lose its status as a hegemonic power—had been percolating in Flint’s brain for years when he recently published his book Near and Far Waters: The Geopolitics of Seapower. The book specifically looks at the Netherlands, Great Britain and the United States for context on how the countries used sea power to project their economic and political influence across the globe.

Flint spoke with Colorado Arts and Sciences Magazine about his book, while also offering insights on how current events are shaping the outlook for the United States and the world. His answers have been edited for clarity and condensed.

Question: What is the context for your book’s title: Near and Far Waters?

Flint: There are legal terms about coasts and the exclusive economic zone around the country’s coastlines, but I’m not using it in that way. I’m thinking about an area of ocean in which a country has interest and influence over and off its coastline.

"Near and Far Waters" by 51�Թ�� alumnus Colin Flint focuses on the Netherlands, Great Britain and the United States for context on how the countries used sea power to project their economic and political influence across the globe.

That is an important piece of ocean for a country because there’s resource exploitation, but it’s also a matter of security. If a country wants to protect itself from potential invasion, it needs to control those waters off its coastline—it’s near waters.

Some countries, once they’ve established control of their near waters, have the ability and desire to project beyond that, across the oceans into what would then become its far waters. If you think about Great Britain in the context of the British Empire, once it fought off European threats to its coastline—its near waters—it was then able to develop the sea power to establish its empire. It was in African far waters, it was in Indian far waters, in Middle East far waters and so on.

Another good example of this would be how the United States of America, over the course of history, pushed other countries out of its near waters. The Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico are good examples, where Spanish and British influence were ended over the 1800s and 1900s. And then by establishing control through annexation of Hawaii and the purchase of Alaska, America developed its Pacific near waters, too, which it expanded upon through the course of World War II, pushing the Japanese back and establishing bases in Okinawa, Japan; the Philippines; and Guam, etc.

Question: One of your chapters is titled ‘No Island is an Island.’ What do you mean by that?

Flint: I was talking about how the projection of sea power requires the control of islands. Often, the geopolitical goal and benefit of controlling an island is not the island itself—it’s how it enables projection of power further, or how it hinders other countries’ projection of power by being near sea lines of communication that you can have a base to try and disrupt. For example, when Hawaii became part of the United States, it allowed the U.S. to project power across the Pacific. Again, it’s not the island itself—it’s the projection of power across an ocean.

Projecting sea power is about more than just having a strong navy.

Question: If one country’s far waters extend into the near waters of another country, that would seem to be a recipe for conflict, would it not?

Flint: That is the kicker, of course, that a sea power’s far waters are another country’s near waters. And it has historically led to conflicts and even wars. It’s always involved violence—and not just between great powers and lesser powers, but also violence against the people living on islands or in coastal lands where sea powers are looking to establish dominance and exploit resources.

Question: China has been rapidly expanding its navy in recent years. Is it simply beefing up its sea forces to protect its near waters, or is it looking to supplant the U.S. as the dominant sea power? Or are there other motives at play?

Flint: You often see in newspaper articles written in the United States and maybe other Western countries that China has the biggest navy in the world. This always makes me laugh because, yes, it’s got hundreds and hundreds of tiny little coastal defense vessels, but even now that it has two aircraft carriers, it does not have the ability to project power like the United States of America, which has 11 carrier groups. So, I think that should always be recognized.

The other sort of trope that’s often wielded out there, which I think we need to question, is: The West is worried about China developing a navy, because it will allow China to disrupt trade networks. Well, wait a minute. China is very dependent on imports, especially of fuel or energy. Additionally, it is the world’s largest trading economy, and it’s worried about the robustness of its domestic economy. They cannot maintain their economic growth based purely on their domestic market, so they need to have a global economic presence for markets and for securing inputs into their economy.

Putting those two things together, it makes no sense why China would want to disrupt global trade. In fact, the country’s reaction to President Trump’s sanctions tells us that the last thing China wants is global trade disrupted. They’re very worried about the fragility of their own economy and whether that leads to social unrest, etc. The flip side of that is how the West could really hurt China by blocking those trade routes to prevent energy imports into China and exports.

China is definitely trying to grow its navy. I think what makes it so interesting is its simultaneous attempt to have a navy that can defend its near waters while perhaps preventing the operation of the United States in its far waters. To what extent China is attempting to establish a presence in its far waters is less clear.

"A sea power’s far waters are another country’s near waters. And it has historically led to conflicts and even wars," notes scholar Colin Flint. ("Naval Battle of 1812," Painting, Oil on Canvas; By Rodolfo Claudus; 1962/U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command)

Question: From your book, it seems like you have some serious concerns about the potential for a serious conflict arising from disputes over near and far waters?

Flint: In fact, I’ve never been so concerned or worried in my career, to be honest with you. When I started teaching my class on political geography many moons ago, let’s say in the mid-1990s, I used to start off with some structural model of global political change, which essentially says, we have cycles of war and peace, for the want of a better term.

And I asked my students to try and get them engaged: ‘Picture yourself in 2025. What are you going to be doing?’ It was staggering to me how many of them believed that they would be millionaires and already retired (laughs).

The point of that was that the model I was using predicted another period of global war, starting in 2025. I don’t do that exercise anymore, because it isn’t funny; it’s really quite serious. So yes, the risk of war is high, and I think it could emerge in a number of different places. One focus is on the South China Sea, the near waters of China, as that is clearly a potential flashpoint. Taiwan is the obvious focal point of what that conflict would look like.

I also wonder about potential flashpoints of conflict in Chinese far waters—and that could include the Arctic and the Northern Atlantic, because another factor that has to be considered is global climate change and the increasing possibility of a trade route through the North Pole, which would cut trade times from China into European markets considerably. Those waters represent U.S. near waters, so …

Question: Do you envision any sort of viable alternatives to a conflict between world powers over near and far waters, especially in today’s environment?

Flint: My motivation with the book was with an eye to waving some sort of flag about how to think about peace rather than war. Most of our lenses are national lenses. If we keep on this pattern of a national lens, then I see a strong likelihood to repeat these cycles of near and far water sea powers, which have always involved a period of global war.

We need to change that lens. We need to have a global view as to why countries are always seeking far waters, entering other people’s near waters and why that can lead to conflict.

Today, we’re facing a humanity-scale problem, which is global climate change. Is that the thing that will tell us we need to work together, rather than compete? I’m not saying it is; I’m saying, if I see a glimmer of optimism to your question, that’s it.

Question: Based upon your research, if a country loses its status as a hegemonic power, can it later recover that status? And, in the context of today’s world, what might things look like if the U.S. lost its hegemonic status?

Flint: The short answer is no, based upon past history, a country that loses its hegemonic status has not been able to reclaim it once it’s gone.

But to your second question, it goes back to the question about what China’s intentions are. In American popular culture, where every sports team has to be No. 1, even if they are eighth in some Mickey Mouse conference, there is this obsession that there has to be a singular winner or champion.

What I’m saying is that we shouldn’t just assume that if the United States declines there will be another emergent dominant power in the world. It’s quite possible that if the United States declines, what might emerge would be a multipolar world, although I don’t know what that might look like.

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Top image: A squadron of the Royal Navy running down the Channel and An East Indiaman preparing to sail, by artist Samuel Atkins (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

3 years later, Marshall Fire impacts still being learned

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 02 Jan 2025 21:23:38 +0000

3 years later, Marshall Fire impacts still being learned Rachel Sauer Thu, 01/02/2025 - 14:23

Colleen E. Reid

Wildfire smoke’s health risks can linger in homes that escape burning—as Colorado’s Marshall Fire survivors discovered

On Dec. 30, 2021, a wind-driven wildfire raced through two communities just outside 51�Թ��, Colorado. In the span of about eight hours, more than 1,000 homes and businesses burned.

The fire left entire blocks in ash, but among them, pockets of houses survived, seemingly untouched. The owners of these homes may have felt relief at first. But fire damage can be deceiving, as many soon discovered.

When wildfires like the Marshall Fire reach the wildland-urban interface, they are burning both vegetation and human-made materials. Vehicles and buildings burn, along with all of the things inside them—electronics, paint, plastics, furniture.

Colleen E. Reid, a 51�Թ�� associate professor of geography, and her research colleagues created a checklist for people to use after urban wildfires in the future to help them protect their health and reduce their risks when they return to smoke-damaged homes.

Research shows that when human-made materials like these burn, the chemicals released are different from what is emitted when just vegetation burns. The smoke and ash can blow under doors and around windows in nearby homes, bringing in chemicals that stick to walls and other indoor surfaces and continue off-gassing for weeks to months, particularly in warmer temperatures.

In a new study released three years after the Marshall Fire, my colleagues and I looked at the health effects people experienced when they returned to still-standing homes. We also created a checklist for people to use after urban wildfires in the future to help them protect their health and reduce their risks when they return to smoke-damaged homes.

Tests in homes found elevated metals and VOCs

In the days after the Marshall Fire, residents quickly reached out to nearby scientists who study wildfire smoke and health risks at the 51�Թ�� and area labs. People wanted to know what was in the ash and causing the lingering smells inside their homes.

In homes we were able to test, my colleagues found elevated levels of metals and PAHs – polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons – in the ash. We also found elevated VOCs – volatile organic compounds – in airborne samples. Some VOCs, such as dioxins, benzene, formaldehyde and PAHs, can be toxic to humans. Benzene is a known carcinogen.

People wanted to know whether the chemicals that got into their homes that day could harm their health.

At the time, we could find no information about physical health implications for people who have returned to smoke-damaged homes after a wildfire. To look for patterns, we surveyed residents affected by the fire six months, one year and two years afterward.

Symptoms six months after the fire

Even six months after the fire, we found that many people were reporting symptoms that aligned with health risks related to smoke and ash from fires.

More than half (55%) of the people who responded to our survey reported that they were experiencing at least one symptom six months after the blaze that they attributed to the Marshall Fire. The most common symptoms reported were itchy or watery eyes (33%), headache (30%), dry cough (27%), sneezing (26%) and sore throat (23%).

All of these symptoms, as well as having a strange taste in one’s mouth, were associated with people reporting that their home smelled differently when they returned to it one week after the fire.

Many survey respondents said that the smells decreased over time. Most attributed the improvement in smell to the passage of time, cleaning surfaces and air ducts, replacing furnace filters, and removing carpet, textiles and furniture from the home. Despite this, many still had symptoms.

We found that living near a large number of burned structures was associated with these health symptoms. For every 10 additional destroyed buildings within 820 feet (250 meters) of a person’s home, there was a 21% increase in headaches and a 26% increase in having a strange taste in their mouth.

These symptoms align with what could be expected from exposure to the chemicals that we found in the ash and measured in the air inside the few smoke-damaged homes that we were able to study in depth.

The Marshall Fire swept through several neighborhoods in Louisville and Superior, Colorado. In the homes that were left standing, residents dealt with lingering smoke and ash in their homes. (Photo: Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images)

Lingering symptoms and questions

There are a still a lot of unanswered questions about the health risks from smoke- and ash-damaged homes.

For example, we don’t yet know what long-term health implications might look like for people living with lingering gases from wildfire smoke and ash in a home.

We found a significant decline in the number of people reporting symptoms one year after the fire. However, 33% percent of the people whose homes were affected still reported at least one symptom that they attributed to the fire. About the same percentage also reported at least one symptom two years after the fire.

We also could not measure the level of VOCs or metals that each person was exposed to. But we do think that reports of a change in the smell of a person’s home one week after the fire demonstrates the likely presence of VOCs in the home. That has health implications for people whose homes are exposed to smoke or ash from a wildfire.

Tips to protect yourself after future wildfires

Wildfires are increasingly burning homes and other structures as more people move into the wildland-urban interface, temperatures rise and fire seasons lengthen.

It can be confusing to know what to do if your home is one that survives a wildfire nearby. To help, my colleagues and I put together a website of steps to take if your home is ever infiltrated by smoke or ash from a wildfire.

Here are a few of those steps:

When you’re ready to clean your home, start by protecting yourself. Wear at least an N95 (or KN95) mask and gloves, goggles and clothing that covers your skin.
Vacuum floors, drapes and furniture. But avoid harsh chemical cleaners because they can react with the chemicals in the ash.
Clean your HVAC filter and ducts to avoid spreading ash further. Portable air cleaners with carbon filters can help remove VOCs.

A recent scientific study documents how cleaning all surfaces within a home can reduce reservoirs of VOCs and lower indoor air concentrations of VOCs.

Given that we don’t know much yet about the health harms of smoke- and ash-damaged homes, it is important to take care in how you clean so you can do the most to protect your health.

Colleen E. Reid is an associate professor in the 51�Թ�� Department of Geography.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Wildfire smoke’s health risks can linger in homes that escape burning—as Colorado’s Marshall Fire survivors discovered.

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Top image: Bmurphy380/Wikipedia Commons

Putin’s plan to stop Ukraine from turning to the west has failed

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Jan 2023 18:53:22 +0000

Putin’s plan to stop Ukraine from turning to the west has failed Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 01/06/2023 - 11:53

Kristin M Bakke , Gerard Toal , John O’Loughlin , Kit Rickard

After interviewing hundreds of participants, our survey shows support for Nato is at an all-time high

When Vladimir Putin sent his war machine into Ukraine last February, one of the reasons he gave for the invasion was to ensure Ukraine’s neutral status and prevent its government from moving the country further towards the west. Though there is more behind this war, the Russian leader has long expressed concerns about the possibility of Ukraine seeking closer military cooperation with Nato, with an eye to eventually joining the alliance. The “special military operation” aimed to stop this in its tracks.

But ten months of bloody warfare has had the reverse effect. There is now a larger Nato military footprint in Ukraine than ever before. Military support – from medical equipment to training and advanced weaponry – has exceeded US$20 billion (£16.8 billion) from Washington alone.

This – and Russia’s inability to topple the Ukrainian government in the early days of the war – are widely accepted to be major strategic blunders by Russia. Putin overestimated the extent of Russia’s support among the Ukrainian people and underestimated the strength of Ukrainian national identity. But how has the war affected attitudes toward neutrality and Nato among ordinary Ukrainians?

Our survey data tracing the attitudes of the same people prior to and after the invasion shows that Ukrainians who previously saw their future oriented towards Russia are now increasingly looking west. Support for Nato membership is at an all-time high, and Ukrainians who previously favoured neutrality no longer do so. These trends are particularly stark among younger respondents.

In 2019-2020, we conducted a set of nationally representative public opinion surveys across several of the states in Russia’s “near abroad”. Given that the Russian government has long used soft power mechanisms (such as pro-Russian social media and television, the church and civil society) to try to convince citizens in these countries that they are part of the “Russian world”, we wanted to assess the geopolitical orientations of ordinary people.

When we designed the project in 2017, we planned to conduct two rounds of surveys to chart whether and how geopolitical changes affected people’s views over time. In cooperation with the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, we conducted the first survey in Ukraine in December 2019 (funded by the US National Science Foundation), and in October 2022 conducted a follow-up survey (funded by the Norwegian Research Council).

Due to the war, the follow-up survey was done by phone rather than face to face. We were able to re-interview almost 20% of those respondents interviewed in 2019. To allow for a representative sample also in 2022, we then used random sampling to top up the sample.

Collecting public opinion is especially challenging in a conflict environment. While our surveys present a unique opportunity to analyse how Russia’s war in Ukraine has shifted public opinion, there are at least two challenges that call for caution.

First, the 20% that we resurveyed may be systematically different from the 80% that we could not resurvey. Those 80% are likely part of the historic numbers of people who have been forcibly displaced within Ukraine or have fled abroad. Equally, many respondents interviewed in 2019 may have joined the Ukrainian military and so did not take part in the 2022 survey. Therefore, we may be capturing those less affected by the war – who may have different views than those most affected.

Second, we should be wary of people’s professed opinions in times of war when the desire to be seen to be “rallying around the flag” induces a strong desire to express patriotic attitudes.

Putin’s war has backfired

Figure 1: 2019 and 2022 responses to a question asking respondents to place Ukraine on an imaginary ten-point scale between the west and Russia, among the 429 interviewed in both surveys (left) and the full samples (right).

With these caveats in mind, whether we look at those respondents who were resurveyed or the full sample, we see a clear orientation towards the west between December 2019 and October 2022. In both surveys, we asked respondents to place where their country should be on an imaginary ten-point scale between the west and Russia, shown in Figure 1.

Our data shows that Russia’s invasion did little but encourage Ukrainians to turn to the west. The invasion and brutal war – including war crimes, the targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, children forcibly moved to Russia, and mass displacement – have, perhaps unsurprisingly, done little to make people look towards Russia for their future.

Figure 2: 2019 and 2022 responses to the question, ‘It is best for our country’s security to be neutral and stay out of military alliances’, among the 20% interviewed in both surveys (left) and the full samples (right).

This trend is particularly stark among those aged 18 to 30, among whom nearly 47% think that Ukraine should be oriented towards the west, compared with just 3% who think it should be oriented towards Russia.

With respect to Nato and neutrality, we see a similar shift. Consistent with other public opinion surveys that, for years, had shown support for Nato membership at 30-40%, our 2019 survey showed that support for joining the alliance was about 44%. But in our October 2022 survey, eight months after the invasion, the share of respondents favouring membership was 77%.

As you might expect, by October 2022 neutrality had become less attractive to many Ukrainians than it was in 2019, when more people than not saw neutrality as the preferred option. Now there is a clear majority against neutrality.

Support is especially high among younger people in the topped-up sample in 2022 – more than 70% of respondents aged between 18 and 30 disagreed with the statement that it would be “best for our country’s security to be neutral and stay out of military alliances”.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been a military fiasco for Russia. It has also accelerated the process it was designed to prevent, the alignment of Ukraine with Euro-Atlantic institutions – especially Nato. Attacking a country where the majority of people before the war looked favourably on neutrality and sceptically towards Nato, Putin’s invasion has managed to flip this sentiment.

Kristin M Bakke, Professor in Political Science and International Relations, UCL; Gerard Toal, Professor of Government and International Affairs, Virginia Tech; John O’Loughlin, Professor of Geography, 51�Թ��, and Kit Rickard, Research Associate at UNU-WIDER, UCL

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

After interviewing hundreds of participants, our survey shows support for Nato is at an all-time high.

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The Marshall Fire, a year later: Hidden toxins and the fire next time

Anonymous — Tue, 03 Jan 2023 19:46:19 +0000

The Marshall Fire, a year later: Hidden toxins and the fire next time Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 01/03/2023 - 12:46

Colleen E. Reid , Joost de Gouw and Michael Hannigan

Homes that survived the Marshall Fire harbored another disaster inside – here’s what we’ve learned about this insidious urban wildfire risk

On Dec. 30, 2021, one of the most destructive wildfires on record in Colorado swept through neighborhoods just a few miles from our offices at the 51�Թ��. The flames destroyed over 1,000 buildings, yet when we drove through the affected neighborhoods, some houses were still completely intact right next to homes where nothing was left to burn.

Although the people who lived in these still-standing homes were spared the loss of everything they owned, when they returned after the fire, they found another disaster.

The aftermath of the Marshall Fire in Louisville, CO.

Noxious smells and ash on their windowsills and doorways initially made their homes unlivable – and potentially hazardous to human health. Some of these residents were still reporting health problems from being in their homes months later, even after the homes had been cleaned.

We study wildfires and their health effects, and we knew people who lost their homes in the Marshall Fire. We also knew we had to act fast to study the fire’s impact so lessons from the Marshall Fire could help homeowners elsewhere avoid similar hazards in the future.

Dangerous chemicals absorbed into homes

Early on, because of our expertise on air quality and health, members of our community reached out to us to ask how they could remediate their homes from the smells and hidden ash, and what health risks they should be concerned about.

But this fire was nothing like the wildfires that our research groups at the University of Colorado had previously studied. Most of what burned on that day was human-made rather than vegetation. When human-made materials like electronics, vehicles and home furnishings burn, they release different types of air pollutants and may affect health differently compared to when vegetation burns.

The outdoor air pollution was less of an issue because the wildfire was short-lived – the powerful winds that fueled the fire quieted down and changed direction about 11 hours after the fire started, and the first snow of the season finally fell. This snowfall ended the fire and cleaned the outside air of pollution.

Wildfire ash and dust entered homes under doors and around windows. Courtesy of Joost de Gouw

The key concern was what chemicals lingered inside the undestroyed homes – soaked up into the fabrics of carpets, sofas, drywall, air vents and more – that would slowly release into the home for some time after the fire.

We hypothesized that there were lots of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) – toxic gases, which were emitted during the fire that had seeped into homes and become embedded in the fabrics and building materials. Of particular concern were aromatic compounds like benzene, a known carcinogen, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are emitted from wildfires and have known health effects. In addition, we were worried about metals in the ash and soot deposited in homes, and the potential for it to become suspended in the air again when people returned and heating systems came on.

Despite knowing that some of these gases were toxic, we did not know the levels inside the homes, or what remediation efforts to suggest to residents, because little scientific research had been published on wildland-urban interface fires like this one. We realized that we needed to do some of that research to help our own community – and the next community affected by a wildland-urban interface fire.

Collecting evidence inside

Many community members volunteered their homes for study sites. When we toured these still-standing homes 10 days after the fire, we saw what a rapid evacuation looks like, with lunch in the process of being made, laundry being folded, toys in the middle of pretend play … and dust, lots and lots of dust resulting from the fire.

We collected dust samples in about a dozen homes and then analyzed the samples in our labs.

We looked for molecules that could help us think about the origin of the dust. Not surprisingly, the dust was a combination of windblown soil, ash from the fire and typical household dust. That ash was high in typical combustion byproducts that are known to be toxic, and there was lots of ash, so cleaning up all the dust was important to remediation.

The homes that had been exposed to heavy smoke also still smelled like a chemical fire. A colleague likened it to the smell of gunpowder.

A chart shows benzene levels in a smoke-infiltrated home decreased when an air cleaner with a carbon-activated filter was running, but then rose again when the air cleaner was turned off. Joost de Gouw

As quickly as we could, we moved a state-of-the-art mass spectrometer into one of the most heavily affected homes in Superior and made measurements of airborne pollutants for five weeks.

Shortly after the Marshall Fire, we found that many pollutants, including PAHs, were indeed at higher levels inside smoke-affected homes than we would expect, but in early February these pollutants had decreased to more normal levels.

We researched ways in which people could protect themselves and found through experiments that air filters with activated carbon could provide excellent temporary relief from the indoor pollutants.

We also observed the results of professional remediation efforts. We are still poring over the air pollution data to understand which materials that burned, such as plastics, car tires, furniture, carpet and roofing material, contributed the most to the air pollutants we observed in the homes.

Continuing health effects

In addition to the air pollution and ash concerns, people living in the neighborhoods that burned are concerned about their health.

In an initial survey, residents reported a variety of symptoms that they think may be due to the smoke or air quality concerns of the fire, with the most common being itchy or watery eyes, headaches, dry cough and sore throat. More than half of respondents also reported disrupted sleep due to the stress of the fire, and almost a quarter attributed headaches at least in part to the stress of the event.

The physical symptoms could be due to the exposure during the fire. However, of those who have moved back into smoke-damaged homes, they report the symptoms most often inside their homes.

Left: Joost de Gouw; Middle: Colleen E. Reid; Right: Michael Hannigan.

This fall, more than nine months after the fire, some residents reported rashes and burning sensations despite having cleaned their homes of ash and the smell of VOCs having dissipated. Another round of surveys is now helping gather more information about lingering symptoms. In addition to physical health symptoms, we are also asking questions about mental health, which is a growing concern from so-called natural disasters.

While we know that the VOC concentrations inside the homes that we worked in have returned to normal levels, some individuals may be more sensitive than others. And while there has been research into the health effects of some VOCs, not all have been studied extensively, nor have studies looked at the health impacts of combinations of VOCs.

As global temperatures rise and more people move into once-wild landscapes at the edges of cities, the risk of wildfires spreading into urban areas rises. We hope that our work can help people deal with the air pollution aftermath of future blazes.

This article is part of a collaboration with 51�Թ�� Reporting Lab, The Center for Environmental Journalism at the 51�Թ��, KUNC public radio and The Conversation U.S. to explore the impacts of the devastating Marshall Fire one year after the blaze. The series can be found at the 51�Թ�� Reporting Lab.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Homes that survived the Marshall Fire harbored another disaster inside – here’s what we’ve learned about this insidious urban wildfire risk.

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