Massive fires have been reported to break out in the forests surrounding the road to Mata Chintpurni temple in Una, Himachal Pradesh. Visuals from the incident show trees and foliage being destroyed by a violent blaze. As per reports, the forest department has been working hard to extinguish the fire since Tuesday. However, extinguishing the fire from one region results in a blaze erupting in another area, requiring immediate attention.
According to reports, the Badhmana and Sidh Chalehar forests in the Una district were burning on Tuesday. It then spread to the Shamlat land in Dangoh. The fire in Badhmana’s government forest at around 12:30 pm caused a huge cloud of smoke, significantly dropping the visibility. As per reports, another fire had broken out in this same forest about 2 days ago but was brought under control by volunteers and the forest department. However, by Tuesday evening, several hectares of this forest had turned into ashes.
The Forest Department had controlled the fire that broke out in Sidh Chalehar forest on Monday evening, but on Tuesday the fire spread from the other end of the forest area. Dangoh forest of Pirthipur beat also kept blazing with fire. Due to the severe fire, there has been huge loss of plantation done in the last years. The irony is that this time is also the breeding season for many birds and the chicks or eggs of the birds growing in the nests are also not safe. To extinguish forest fire, the Forest Department controls it using old technology. Modern equipment like air blower and leaf blower are not yet available with the department. Despite this, in adverse geographical conditions, forest workers and villagers have been extinguishing the fire using traditional means and it is certain that the same method is being used this time also in the fire season.
According to information received, the fire department vehicles are not able to reach the remote forests of Chintpurni area and there is no provision of water there. In such a situation, forest department personnel also adopt the counter fire (Chheka) method to stop the fire from spreading further. In this method, a strip of the un-burnt area of forest is subjected to fire from a safe distance towards the advancing blaze. On the other side of this strip, the forest personnel are deployed to put off the fire so that the fire does not spread to the other side. The counter fire burns all the fuel material so that when the advancing fire reaches this area; it subsides and gets doused due to the lack of fuel on the forest floor i.e., fresh grass and foliage.
Range Officer of the Forest Department, Kishori Lal said that the incidents of fire in the forests have increased continuously since last 3 days. The forest department team is trying to stop the fire in the forests. A case will be registered with the police against the anti-social entities who are likely to be starting the fires.