Yahoo TV

STORY: Fatima Brandao is searching for her chickens in a haze of smoke…

The source: fires, tearing through the world’s largest tropical wetland in central-western Brazil faster than ever before.

Brandao just turned 59.

She’s lived her whole life here... and says she's never seen anything like it.

"There never used to be smoke here. The sun shone clearly and the sky was always blue.”

“Now the whole hill is on fire and smoke has clouded the entire area.”

Experts say this year could overtake 2020 as the Pantanal wetlands’ worst year for wildfires on record... after a shortfall of rain disrupted seasonal flooding.

Scientists blame an amped-up El Nino weather pattern, fueled by climate change.

The worst of the usual dry season is still ahead.

These wetlands are about 10 times the size of the Florida everglades… and home to animals like jaguars and anacondas.

“I feel a lot of sadness, because if we are here we are breathing and we think that breathing is critical, imagine what the animals in the field are experiencing.”

The people who live in the Pantanal mostly farm, hunt and fish...

But they are increasingly turning to ecotourism to make a living.

Brandao is retired.

She says it’s hard to do anything around the house.

“The smell becomes very strong. You can clean the house in the morning, in the afternoon you sweep it with a broom, throw water on everything again, even in the evening, but dust enters the house, covering everything."