Understanding the Basics of Forest Fire Mitigation
iasparliament
March 26, 2018
What is the issue?
A massive forest fire at Kurangani forest in Theni district of Tamil Nadu has caused huge causality. Click here to know more
This tragedy raises several issues of approaches in fighting fires and ways of mitigating damage.
What are the available approaches in addressing forest fire?
Controlled burning -The British introduced a system of controlled burning of undergrowth in safe seasons (say, during winter), so that by summer there would be nothing left to burn.
This is an extremely destructive practice, since it wipes out insects, small reptiles, seeds, herbs and bushes.
Fire Line- This method contain the fire in compartments bordered by natural barriers such as streams, roads, ridges, and fire lines along hillsides or across plains.
A fire line is a line through a forest which has been cleared of all vegetation, the width depends on the type of forest being protected.
Once the blaze has burnt out all combustibles in the affected compartment, it fizzles out and the neighbouring compartments are saved.
Counter fire approach - This follows setting up of a counter fire, so that when a fire is unapproachable for humans, a line is cleared of combustibles and manned.
One waits until the wildfire is near enough to be sucking oxygen towards it, and then all the people manning the line set fire to the line simultaneously.
The counter fire rushes towards the wildfire, leaving a stretch of burnt ground, as soon as the two fires meet, the blaze is extinguished.
Combination method -This is practised in combination with fire lines and counter fire.
This is the most practical and most widely used, is to have enough people with leafy green boughs to beat the fire out.
Technological approach - In this Helicopters or ground-based personnel spray fire retardant chemicals, or pump water to fight the blaze.
These are expensive methods and make sense when one is protecting a human community, but are usually not practised in India.
What is the forest fire monitoring mechanism in India?
A fire anywhere in the world is detected by NASA’s MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) and VIIRS (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) satellites.
Then Forest Survey of India (FSI) analyses such data by overlaying the digitised boundaries of forest areas to pinpoint the location to the exact forest compartment.
The FSI relays news of the fire to the concerned State, so that the Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) in charge of the forest where the fire is raging is informed.
Earlier the time lapse between spotting the fire and the news reaching the DFO was five to six hours, but this has been reduced to about two hours recently.
Meanwhile, news of the fire would have reached the DFO from his guards in watchtowers and on patrol and the DFO decides whom to deploy.
There will be a master fire control room which is informed and which sends firefighters from local fire crew stations to fight the blaze.
What are few shortfalls in mitigating forest fires?
In India Forest departments face a huge constraint of funds, major amounts of funds are used for frivolous purposes like ‘planting forests’, instead of investing in mitigating infrastrucres.
While communication and response time have been cut down, the actual numbers of Forest Department personnel that are sent to put out fires are woefully inadequate.
Contract fire fighters with inadequate training are recruited due to corrupt officials and political parties.
How mitigation efforts can be enhanced?
Respective Governments need to vastly increase the number of firefighters as well as equip them properly with adequate gears and other essentials.
Seasonal labour with adequate training can be contracted during the fire season to the fill gaps of fire fighters, Local villagers would be the best resource.
More Forest Department field staff could be hired to put out fires during the fire season and to patrol the forests during other times.
Recruitment of field staffs and investments in equipments must be done by discontinuing the claimed ‘forest plantations’, this would help rejuvenation of fire-stressed forest ecosystems.
Giving access to the public to reserve forests would have a salutary effect on the quality of life and the quality of field researchers available within the country.
