The age of fire is upon us, scientists say, and the public and private system built to contain it is being pushed to its limits. While firefighting is still primarily done on the ground, governments and frightened residents are increasingly demanding costly assistance from the air.

The European Union created a reserve fund this year for firefighting aircraft, with contracts allowing for deployments across national borders. Bolivia leased the world’s only Boeing 747 water bomber to fight fires in the Amazon in August, after the plane had been used in Israel in 2016, Chile in 2017 and California in 2018.

Meanwhile in Asia, South Korea is reaching out to companies like 10 Tanker Air Carrier in New Mexico, while Indonesia borrowed an air tanker from Australia a few years ago that came from Coulson Aviation in Canada, which is now doubling the size of its contract fleet, while developing new technologies for mapping and fighting fires at night.

What these companies and fire officials say they are planning for is a world ablaze year-round.

“It’s coming from all over,” said John E. Gould, president of 10 Tanker Air Carrier, who started his career fighting fires in Alaska in the 1970s. “Fires are affecting climates and places they never used to affect.”