On the second day of the firefighting operation in the Uttarakhand forests, with the help of an Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopter, the battleground was still going on and the fire was getting controlled in several areas. So officials reported.
The state registered eight fresh forest fires that gutted 11.75 hectares in the last 24 hours, against 23 such fires that destroyed 34.7175 hectares between Friday evening and Saturday evening. The forest department announced the developments in a bulletin released today.
It has been reported so far that last month, between November 1 and 30, Uttarakhand recorded 606 forest fires that impacted over 669.796 hectares of forestland. Therefore, according to the news release, 527.465 hectares of forest land were gutted and girdled by the forest fires during this period.
However, today there have been no blazes in the jungles during the last 24 hours, Akanksha Prasanna Kumar Patro, the chief conservator of forests in Kumaon, said.
In Kumaon, flames are flaring from sites two to three in Nainital, one in Champawat, Almora, Pithoragarh, and Bageshwar, and we are putting our engagement to move into the region, Patro said.
A fire in the forests of Ladiyakata and Pines area near the Bhowali road was extinguished due to the deployment of the IAF helicopter, which was on canvassing on Saturday, says the officer of the DFO.
Recently, after the forest fire reached very close to the High Court Colony (which hosts the residence of the Chief Justice of India) and the Air Force base containing sensitive hardware on Friday, an Indian Air Force rescue helicopter was brought in to help quell the flames.
The forest fire along with adjoining areas of Nainital is progressively being contained after the helicopter of the Indian Air Force was deployed in the morning of last Saturday, as stated by the Chief Minister, Pushkar Singh Dhami, after the situation had been monitored in the region of Kumaon in the evening of Saturday.
That is what Patro says, and this is exactly what they are trying to do right now: douse the flames in other places, and then eventually everything will be under control.
