South American Ashlands

Although Armor Corps was aware of the fungal infection in Uruguay as early as 2014, after initial clashes with infected lifeforms, ACC turned its attention to more pressing matters and left the containment and eradication of the fungus to the Green Initiative, the faction with the most significant holdings in the region. Considering the issue adequately addressed, the matter of the fungus was more or less forgotten for several years as the Human-Vannai War went on. Periodic status inquiries from ACC to the GI enclave had received assurances that the situation was perfectly under control.
In early 2019, it would be discovered that this was anything but the truth. The reports had been falsified and the fungal infection had exploded to corrupt almost the entire South American continent. GI had been utterly lax in their duties and allowed the fungus to spread while remaining safe in their Venezuela stronghold. By the time ACC discovered the truth, over 14 million square kilometers of the continent had become infected by the fungus and an estimated 400 million people had lost their lives to it.
ACC was left with a grim decision to make regarding how to handle this disaster. After five years of unchecked growth, the fungus had rooted itself into every level of the South American ecosystem. Although the Armor Corps possessed the means to develop a fungicide to counter it, eradication of the fungus would also result in the eradication of every lifeform infected with it. The only alternative aside from simply continuing to ignore the fungus was to contain its expansion indefinitely through military means. ACC Command made the call and ordered that the fungicide be deployed.
Operation Fungus Finale was launched, delivering the fungicide to the original site of the infestation: Durazno, Uruguay. As expected, the fungicide succeeded in killing the fungus off, along with every lifeform infested by it, which by this point in time represented over 80% of the South American biosphere. The ensuing mass plant and animal death left released extraordinary amounts of methane sparked into an apocalyptic firestorm that consumed the entire continent, reducing the South American landmass into an ash-covered wasteland over the course of six months.
The death of the South American biosphere as a result of the Green Initiative's laxity represents the single most devastating ecological disaster in recorded history, on par with prehistoric global extinction events. The conflagration of nearly all flora and fauna on the continent has irrevocably transformed South American into a desert of ash, venting billions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere and removing a significant means of reabsorbing it. Drastic environmental changes have already been observed with increased rainfall in the British Isles, and less rainfall in southern France/north Iberia and the west coast of North America. Tropical hurricanes are expected to become much more powerful, and the global temperature is expected to slowly rise, though there are disagreements over by how much.
Category:PACYOA: TE
Category:South America
Category:Green Initiative