BHUBANESWAR: The Forest Department on Friday said around 15,723 km of fire lines are being created in different wildlife and territorial divisions while 1,630 km of existing lines are being strengthened to combat forest fires this year.
Odisha has started recording incidents from different divisions as the forest fire season commenced on January 1.
The forest fire report for the first month of the season revealed that the state recorded around 786 fire points including 36 large fire points in different divisions till February 5. Nabarangpur division recorded the highest 125 fire points, while Sundargarh and Sambalpur stood second and third with 72 and 68 fire points respectively.
PCCF and HoFF Debidutta Biswal said the number increased further to 803 fire points on February 6 of which more than 60 per cent were outside forest boundaries. However, forest field staff immediately attended at least 801 points, taking the overall response percentage to 99.37 per cent.
As the leaf shedding has already started in the forests and will continue till early April increasing the risk of forest fires, Biswal said, the field staff have intensified the drive of creating fire lines. “To tackle the challenge of forest fire, 533 fire protection squads along with vehicles have been deployed this year,” the PCCF said.
He said a total 4,663 leaf blowers along with other equipment such as rakes and safety kits for fire-fighting squads have also been provided. About 6,700 mobile phones have been registered for receiving SMS alerts, while 24X7 control rooms have been made operational in state and divisional headquarters.
“Staff are using forest fire application in their mobile phones for navigation, incident and response reporting. On pilot basis, five AI cameras have also been installed in Similipal for receiving near real-time alerts. District action plan for all the districts have also been completed for coordination among the line departments,” Biswal said.