Smoke over the Amazon

I just got back to Manaus after a couple days reporting from the interior of Amazonas state for a story that will air next week.

 

The flight from the interior of the Amazon back to Manaus was on 5 person Cessna-type plane. The pilot flew very low, right over the top of the endless expanse of some of the thickest parts of the Amazon rainforest. I have flown over the Amazon many times. But this flight was memorable because of how low we were, getting a good look at the forest below. It was a unique perspective you would never get from a commercial flight.

 

The scene below was beautiful…and very dreadful at the same time.

 

The splendor was peering out the window of the plane at the top of the forest canopy passing below like an endless greenish carpet. That sight never gets old.

 

The ugly side was the thick haze over the forest. This month is the dry part of the year, when people start to burn patches of the forest as the first step to clear cutting.

 

The haze – which looks like fog - hanging over the forest is the smoke from this initial clearing. (A small portion of the fires started are natural, from lighting strikes. The majority are man made).

 

These photos below are a few photos I took. They are not National Geographic quality and I won’t pretend otherwise. They were taken through the window of the small plane that was bouncing about.

 

The white haze is not a reflection or bad image quality. That is actually the haze from the fires burning in the forest.

 

 

These photos are not the stuff of glossy Amazon travel books, where everything is ever so perfect.

 

These photos are the Amazon – December 1, 2009 around 11 am local time – in all its beauty. And all the disappointment of seeing blotches of it destroyed by mankind.