UC Merced Researchers Publish New Study: How Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Fuel Record-Breaking Wildfires in 2020? Appeals Court Backs Celebrity Cruises in COVID-19 Suit Filed by Crew Members, and other C-Virus related stories
UC Merced Researchers Publish New Study: How Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Fuel Record-Breaking Wildfires in 2020?
Nearly 10,000 fires burned more than 4.2 million acres in 2020
May 7, 2025 – By Patty Guerra, UC Merced – In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic impacted many facets of life, including health care, schools and the work environment.
A new study by UC Merced researchers shows evidence that the pandemic also fueled an elevated number of wildfires in the United States that year.
How?
With schools and businesses shutting down and people trying to maintain safe social distances outside their pandemic pods, many headed out to nature for respite. That contributed to a 36% increase in the number of recreation-caused fires, like campfires, in 2020.
The study led by Adam Jorge, a Ph.D. student in the Management of Complex Systems program, showed that 2020 had one of the highest numbers of human-caused ignitions in the past three decades.
Those fires consumed a record-breaking amount of land in the Western United States. According to CalFire, nearly 10,000 fires burned over 4.2 million acres, more than 4% of the state’s roughly 100 million acres of land, making 2020 the largest wildfire season recorded in California’s modern history.
The UC Merced research team, in partnership with Oregon State University, Boise State University and USDA Forest Service scientists, reviewed nearly 30 years of fire ignition records, weather data, public land visitation data and data from Google’s Community Mobility Reports to assess the influence of social disruptions indirectly tied to COVID-19 on wildfire ignitions. The study spans 11 Western states and specifically explores the distinct patterns in the increased number of debris burning, recreational use and fireworks-caused ignitions observed in 2020.
The article – “COVID-19 Fueled an Elevated Number of Human-Caused Ignitions in the Western United States During the 2020 Wildfire Season” – was recently published in Earth’s Future. Among its key findings: —>READ MORE HERE
Appeals court backs Celebrity Cruises in COVID-19 suit filed by crew members:
A federal appeals court Tuesday rejected allegations of false imprisonment and intentional infliction of emotional distress after crew members were forced to remain on board a Celebrity Cruises ship during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic.
A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the Miami-based cruise line in the lawsuit filed by crew members who wanted to return to their homes in the Philippines. The cruise industry temporarily shut down in 2020 to try to prevent spread of the disease after the pandemic hit.
Ryan Maunes Maglana and Francis Karl Bugayong, who worked on Celebrity’s Millennium cruise ship, filed the lawsuit in 2020 in South Florida. Tuesday’s opinion said passengers were able to leave the ship on Feb. 10, 2020, in Singapore but crew members remained on board as it crossed the Pacific Ocean, ultimately docking in Mexico.
On March 14, 2020, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a “no sail order” that suspended cruise-ship operations from U.S. ports, the opinion said. Maglana, Bugayong and many other Filipino crew members were denied permission to leave the ship, which traveled to a bay off the San Diego coast and anchored.
While the ship was anchored, Maglana was accused of taking a bottle of scotch from a ship bar and sharing it with Bugayong, the opinion said. They were fired but could not leave the ship.
Celebrity on May 3, 2020, certified compliance with a federal protocol to allow crew members to return to their home countries. On May 21, 2020, as Filipino crew members remained on the ship, Maglana filed an initial version of the lawsuit, the opinion said. Several days later, Celebrity sent Maglana, Bugayong, and 200 other Filipino crewmembers to the Philippines on a charter flight. —>READ MORE HERE
Follow links below to relevant/related stories and resources:
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USA TODAY: Coronavirus Updates
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NEW YORK POST: Coronavirus The Latest
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