Worrying videos and pictures show how the pristine polar region of northern Yakutia is ablaze.

Destruction of trees by flames could see Batagai Depression ‘rapidly enlarge’ while remote local settlements also threatened.

Summer 2020 follows unusually hot and dry spring in swinging between the extremes.

Lena Pillars, a World Heritage Site, hit by the rampant flames, as calls grow for greater efforts to tackle infernos.

Recent reports showed 89 wildfires in Siberia and 25 in the Russian Far East as a new season of damage to forests gets underway.

Topsy-turvy summer swings from Saudi-heat to freezer in Arctic north of Russia’s largest region of Yakutia.

Roads blocked, planes diverted due to low visibility, schools shut, people advised to stay home.

New statistics on Saturday showed the vast scale of the human effort in Russia to halt a natural disaster that has destroyed swathes of woodland and taiga.

After a month of warm, dry weather and wildfires, the huge crater nicknamed ‘Mouth of Hell’ is now under direct threat.