Manaus Closes Schools as Wildfire Smoke Blankets City During Intense El Niño

On Friday, authorities told public schools in Manaus—the biggest city in Brazil’s Amazon basin—to stay shut as a thick blanket of smoke from hundreds of wildfires rolled into the city, leading health officials to recommend avoiding outdoor activities.

The haze, persisting for several days, represents the newest effect of a strengthening El Niño that has produced unusually dry weather throughout the Amazon. Satellite photos reveal a marked increase in fires this month, with blazes breaking out in both forested and cleared lands, pushing air‑quality in the capital into hazardous territory.

Local health authorities cautioned that the particulate matter in the smog can worsen breathing issues, especially for children, seniors and people with pre‑existing ailments. Because schools were judged high‑risk settings, the municipal education department halted classes until air quality gets better.

Fires in the Amazon are a regular occurrence, yet their number and magnitude typically rise in El Niño years, when lower rainfall and higher temperatures turn the landscape into a tinderbox. Comparable peaks were documented in 2015 and 2019, years that also experienced extensive school shutdowns and public‑health warnings across the area.

Municipal officials have installed monitoring devices to measure pollutant levels and are working with state and federal bodies to curb the fires. Although firefighting assets have been dispatched, authorities admit that the sheer volume of ignition points and the remoteness of many sites hinder suppression attempts.

Experts note that the present crisis highlights the wider difficulty of reconciling economic activity, land‑use shifts and climate variability in the Amazon. With the El Niño episode ongoing, residents should anticipate ongoing air‑quality warnings, and officials have warned that additional school interruptions could occur if conditions worsen.