DIMPLE LAKE, Alaska _ The Arctic is burning. It long has, of course, but now with greater regularity and more ferocity. Splinters of lightning crackle on the tundra, setting ablaze runaway fires that toast the landscape black.

Growing numbers of Japanese tourists are visiting Alaska this time of year to see the aurora borealis, helping to create a lucrative winter tourism market in a cold, cold state that is primarily a summer destination.

By RACHEL D'ORO ANCHORAGE, Alaska - For Japanese newlyweds Jun and Chisako Shibata, the perfect honeymoon meant standing on a steep Alaska mountain in the freezing darkness, gazing up at the dancing lights in the sky. "Amazing," Chisako Shibata said of the aurora borealis, or northern lights.

ANCHORAGE (Reuters) - Rising temperatures in Alaska have sparked an unusual number of storms along the state's south-central coast this summer, officials say, and the multitude of lightning strikes and resulting fires have burned more than 1 million acres .

Alaska has a history of booms -- fur, gold, oil. This summer could see another -- a 'shroom boom. Morel mushrooms, treasured for French cooking, often thrive on land in the year following a forest fire, and Alaska set records in scorched earth last year.