Popular Counter-Strike streamer NBK has raised over $12,000 for Australian wildlife rehabilitation.

Australia is still on fire, which is a problem. So far, over 26 million acres have been destroyed. To put that into perspective, imagine if Switzerland, Denmark, and part of Belgium all caught fire and burned to the ground. Now, there are slight differences since all those European countries are much more densely populated and Australia only lost 2,200 homes, but the scale of the Australian bushfires is still staggering.

Worse, it’s killing a lot of animals. Ecologists estimate over 1 billion animals have died as a result of the fires, and many more will die due to lack of food and habitat.

The Australia Zoo is helping out as much as they can, but they need funding for food, medical supplies, and additional habitat. So French CS:GO streamer and OG teammate NBK (also known as Nathan Schmitt) decided to host a charity stream last weekend to do what he could to save the Aussie animals.

To incentivize his viewers into giving, NBK offered several tiers of rewards after donations reached certain levels. At 1,500 Euros, he agreed to do a stream in the cosplay of the chat’s choice. At 2,500 Euros, he agreed to shave his beard into whatever the donors wanted (which turned out to be a horseshoe mustache, of all things). And at 3,000 Euros, NBK agreed to match the donation with 3,000 Euros out of his own pocket.

All told, the charity stream raised 8002.54 Euros, which when combined with the 3,000 Euros NBK donated, works out to a little over $12,200 USD.

All proceeds will be sent to the Australia Zoo Wildlife Warriors, which will use the funds to help rehabilitate endangered animals injured in the bushfires. And after these deadly fires, they’re pretty much all endangered. Even the platypuses. Won’t someone think of the platypuses?!

NBK is just the latest in a long string of gamers, streamers, and developers helping to end the fires and rehabilitate wildlife. We’ll need many more before this crisis is over, and if global warming continues, we may need much more.

Source: Twitter