Vegetation management saved 7,000 tonnes of soil carbon losses in one of the UK’s highest severity peatland fires

<title>Abstract</title> <p> Peatlands are vulnerable to drought conditions, which not only lead to their drying and degradation, but increase their vulnerability to fire. Their large carbon store means that when a fire occurs, the combustion of peat can result in significant and often irrecoverable carbon losses. Here we report on one of the United Kingdom’s most severe peatland fires, classified by the depth of peat burned, the Langdale Moor Fire, which covered 1,239 ha. We show that this fire released 25 kt of soil carbon into the atmosphere and burnt up to 20 cm down into the peat. However, recent vegetation management patches across the site left small islands of unburned landscape saving almost 7 kt of soil carbon loss, where if not ‘saved’ would have led to total carbon emissions being greater than that of UK’s 2025 mega fire at Dava Moor, which burned into the underlying peat and covered &gt;10,000 ha. However, calculated per burned area the fire at Langdale emitted 2.03 kg.m ^-2 compared to 0.32 kg.m ^-2 at Dava. This highlights that surface vegetation management plays a critical role in reducing peatland carbon loss during wildfires and in providing future resilience. </p>