Revision as of 18:45, 19 June 2024

The year-wise occurrence of fires

2012-15

Forest fires, Uttarakhand; Graphic courtesy: The Times of India, May 3, 2016

Satellite images of forest fires in Uttarakhand, 2012 and 2015; Graphic courtesy: The Times of India, May 3, 2016

Uttarakhand's rain deficit, June 2015-April 2016; Graphic courtesy: The Times of India, May 3, 2016

See graphics:

Forest fires, Uttarakhand

Satellite images of forest fires in Uttarakhand, 2012 and 2015

Uttarakhand's rain deficit, June 2015-April 2016

2018, May: 19th, 20th

70 ha of forests lost in U’khand fires in 2 days, May 22, 2018: The Times of India

At least 57 small and big incidents of fires and 65 fire alerts were reported from forests across Uttarakhand in the past three days in both Garhwal and Kumaon divisions.

“A total of 69.71hectares of forest area was lost due to fire incidents on Saturday and Sunday while we haven’t yet collated the damages caused in incidents on Monday,” BP Gupta, chief conservator of forests told TOI. He added that the economic loss due to the fires was estimated to be Rs 3.5 lakh.

“The main cause of the fires was negligence on part of people who had lit a fire in or near the forest area. Thankfully, there have been no reports of any loss to life or injuries,” he said.

Forest officials said that fires have been reported from Bageshwar, Srinagar, Almora, Haridwar and Haldwani among other places.

In Uttarkashi, district administration confirmed that around 9 hectare forest land had been gutted in wildfire.

2018, May: more fires

Shivani Azad, 88 more forest fires in U’khand, 1,213 ha gutted, May 23, 2018: The Times of India

The forests of Haridwar, Pauri Garhwal and Almora continued to burn with 88 more incidents of forest fires being reported. A total of 1,213 hectares have been gutted in the state since the beginning of the fire season in February, officials said.

The raging fires have also resulted in losses of Rs 21 lakh and, with the meteorological department predicting heat wave conditions to continue across the state in the coming days, the situation appears unlikely to ease.

On Monday, the forest department received 373 satellite alerts of probable fires of which 88 turned out to be real. In the 88 incidents, 115 hectares of forest land was reportedly gutted, amounting to a loss of Rs 2.03 lakh, officials said.

The total count of forest fires this season has gone up to 741, according to the forest department.

Maximum blazes were reported in the Garhwal region

(468), including 299 incidents in Shivalik, followed by Kumaon (229). Around 520.4 hectares of forest land, including 119.25 hectares in the Shivalik range, have been gutted in forest fires followed by 484.48 hectares in Kumaon.

Chief conservator of forests (forest fire and disaster managment), BP Gupta, told TOI, “The situation will be crucial for next 4-5 days as the maximum temperature has already touched 40 degrees and it will rise further.”

2019 June: 2nd worst forest fires in 16 years

Anup Sah, Nainital-based environmentalist, Padma Shri awardee, February 12, 2020:: The Times of India

Forest fires rage in Uttarakhand, May 9- June 7, 2019
From: Anup Sah, Nainital-based environmentalist, Padma Shri awardee, February 12, 2020:: The Times of India

Vinod Chand, 38, prayed as the flaming orange glow from a nearby forest inched closer. This was the third time this summer that the jungle near his village of Suryagaon, 30km from Nainital town, was on fire. Soon, worried groups of residents were knocking on Chand’s door, armed with shovels and containers in a frantic attempt to tackle the blaze. Several hours later, they had managed to keep the inferno from heading in the direction of their houses.

“No food was cooked in many houses that day. Firewood was scarce. Not everyone has an LPG cylinder here,” Chand told TOI as he recalled the incident from last week.

From March to May this year, 2,521 hectares of forests have gone up in smoke; homes and livestock have been lost, and a spike in man-animal conflict has been reported from affected areas. The infernos continue to rage despite crores being spent on mitigation and prevention measures. On May 28 alone, 94 forest fires spread over 161 hectares were reported. The nightmarish state of affairs can be gauged from the fact that a chopper carrying government officials was forced to make an emergency landing in Gopeshwar in Chamoli district after pilot reported zero visibility due to smoke.

An Indian news website said that while replying to a comment on the blaze, Mark Parrington, senior scientist working with the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), wrote on Twitter: “Looking at the May monthly total fire radiative power, 2019 is second worst in 16 years after 2012.”

The unabated fires are a grim reminder that not much has changed since 4,538 hectares were gutted in 2016, the worst year on record. The menace of forest fires is by no means new. Since the formation of Uttarakhand in 2000, the hill state has lost 44,518 hectares of forest land to fire. Yet, mitigation techniques seemed to have had little or no effect at all.

TOI found that measures to deal with forest fires were often inadequate and in several cases just paid lip service to the cause. The chief conservator of forests (forest fires and disaster management) has remained a toothless tiger. The post was especially created to fight forest fires after devastating blazes in the year 2016. A former official who held the position told TOI that the chief conservator for fire management had “absolutely no authority to make a difference”. He said, “I had no power to make budgetary allocations, initiate surveys or research. Forest fire management needs statewide long-term policies, but there was no provision for that.”

The Forest Drone Force is also stretched thin. Apart from checking for illegal mining and poaching, the fleet of aerial vehicles has to watch out for the fires. “There are only five drones at our disposal. And they are not dedicated solely to monitoring forest fires. How can five drones be expected to cover an entire state?” said another official on condition of anonymity.

According to the forest department, though, the drones have alerted it to at least 100 incidents in Nainital and Almora districts.

Forest officials say that state’s difficult terrain leads to slower response Meanwhile, a service that allows the public to report forest fires has failed to take off. On May 28, 94 such incidents were reported, but toll-free numbers of the department that allow people to send alerts recorded only 15 calls. A woman operator on duty said that the low number of calls was due to the fact that most people prefer calling local officials since they believe it would result in faster action.

A unique service launched this year to allow people to send alerts to the forest department on social media has received poor response. User engagement is so low that barely 10 people bother to send alerts on their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram handles combined per week. Techniques to combat forest fires have had little or no impact in Uttarakhand

Parag Madhukar Dhakate, conservator of forests (Western Circle) and the flag bearer of such initiatives in Uttarakhand, said that social media has helped them engage more people and it would take some time before it could become an effective tool to reduce damage.

Forest officials said that the state’s difficult terrain is partly to blame. The response is slower and the potential for fires to grow beyond control is greater in remote areas where fire brigades cannot reach.

Roping in local residents as well as revival of natural water sources is key to protecting our forests

Climate change has compounded the problem. Shekhar Pathak, environmentalist and Padma Shri awardee, said rising temperatures and negligible winter rains have made the landscape drier and more susceptible to fire. Research on wildfires in the US and Indonesia has also established a link with climate change. Scientists in both the countries have found that with soaring temperatures, wildfires have increased over the past decades. The blazes are larger and the fire season now lasts longer.

Anup Sah, Nainital-based environmentalist and another Padma Shri awardee, said community forest management was essential to eliminate the threat of forest fires. “Roping in local residents as well as revival of natural water sources is key to protecting our forests.”

How other countries control wildfires

Remove anything that adds fuel to wildfires using bulldozers, tree harvesters, hand tools

Dig trenches around fires to enable firefighters suppress them

Put out fires by wetting, smothering or chemically quenching them

2020: fires down to 134 from 2,000 a year before

Shivani Azad, U’khand forest fires down to 134 from 2,000 incidents last year, June 27, 2020: The Times of India

Forest fires that occurred with alarming regularity between February and June in Uttarakhand, ravaging thousands of hectares of forests and affecting hundreds annually, have recorded a drastic decline this year. From 2,158 wildfire incidents last year, the number was down to just 134 this season — a 93% decrease in caseswhile 170 hectares were lost to smoke compared with nearly 3,000 hectares in 2019.

But it’s not just Uttarakhand, the dip in forest fires during peak season was recorded across India. As per data accessed by TOI from the Forest Survey of India, 21,110 fire alerts — the lowest in past five years — were recorded across India between February and mid-June, a 20% reduction from 2019 when 26,641 alerts were registered.

FSI uses real-time data from satellites to monitor forest fires and send SMS alerts. “The number of actual incidents and alerts that are sent may vary because sometimes even controlled burning by forest departments to create firebreak lines are recorded,” said Subhash Ashutosh, director general of FSI. He said FSI has categorised forests based on their vulnerability to fires which allows for targeted allocation of resources.

Remedies, preventive steps

The Times of India, May 08 2016

Sharma Seema

Flames have destroyed 4,000 hectares of forests. From clearing pine needles to fire lines, here are some lessons that need to be learnt Finally , Uttarakhand's forests are no longer ablaze. The last of the fires were doused on Wednesday as the skies opened up and the rain gods took over the firefighting job from 11,000 personnel. By then, almost 4,000 hectares of the Himalayan state's forest cover had been gutted. The economic loss is still being calculated but the cost to the environment may be worse. Scientists warn that the black carbon from the fires may melt glaciers, cause a delay in the monsoons and pollute rivers. Massive soil erosion due to loss of the upper soil layer may also trigger floods if the monsoons are heavy this year.

Pine needles menace

What could have fanned the blaze? Was it the chir pine trees that make up 16-17% of the state's forests? The highly combustible pine needles from these trees are believed to be a major culprit in the fires spreading rapidly across the jungles. According to estimates, more than 3 crore tonnes of pine needles spread across the state's 53 lakh hectares of forest have not been cleared for years. “These pine needles are filled with resin and are ticking time bombs which can raze entire jungles with one flick of a matchstick,“ says environmentalist Anil Joshi. The high temperature and dry earth due to scanty rainfall in the winter months may have added further fuel.

Now, the forest department is asking villagers staying near forests to take away the pine needles -as many as they want. State forest secretary S Ramaswamy says the government is also exploring ways to utilize them as raw material in small electric projects, making of fuel bricks, etc.

Maintaining fire lines

Proven fire-preventing practices, some dating to colonial times, have been ignored. Over 4,500 fire lines -stretches kept vegetation-free to stop fires from spreading -most of which were set up by the British, have not been maintained for years. These are now overgrown with trees, which cannot be removed due to a Supreme Court ban on tree-felling above an altitude of 1,000 metres. Ramaswamy says there are now plans to clear the fire lines and the government is “waiting for a written order from the environment ministry“.

Fund crunch

Meanwhile, the blame game is on. “A Rs 8-crore fund was released from the CAMPA (Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Au thority) scheme to make arrangements for fire control and clear the fire lines.The fund, which should have been made available to the forest department by January, came just a week ago when large parts of the forest had been gutted,“ says a senior forest official.

Delay in funds is a primary reason cited by officials for not containing the fires in time. “It is essential that funds are made available in December-January before the start of the fire season so that forest officials can be provided with the necessary equipment and sufficient manpower is at hand, especially fire watchers and labourers who can work on clearing old fire lines and making new ones,“ says Amit Negi, state disaster management secretary.

Who's accountable?

Experts say officials cannot shirk responsibility by citing insufficient funds.“In the 1950s, a forest ranger would have been denied promotion if his range had serious forest fires. Thermometers were maintained in each ranger's office to keep a watch on the temperature and sound an alert if it reached a certain threshold, above which there was a risk of fire,“ says R S Tolia, former chief secretary of Uttarakhand. “Of course, at that time, the area under a range was much smaller. Today , forest staff is burdened with management of much larger territories and has to deal with increasing political interference. But this is no excuse for lack of accountability on their part,“ he adds. An inquiry has been ordered by the chief secretary on why fire lines were not cleared in time.

Involve locals

Questions are also being asked about why the help of local communities residing near forests was not sought. Forest officials say almost all the fires were ignited by villagers who believe the fresh grass that grows from the ashes is nutritious, providing rich fodder for their cattle. “We chose to ignore their acts because we didn't want to antagonize them,“ says an official. But as fires spiralled out of control, 48 cases were registered in April against those responsible for starting them.

Rather than penalising, says Tolia, villagers should be co-opted into a participatory role. “There are almost 12,000 van panchayats, governing bodies of villagers to manage forests near their village. They can play an active role in fire dousing or curbing illegal activities if coordination is smooth,“ he says.

2019/ Crores spent but forest fires still rage

Vineet Upadhyay, June 7, 2019: The Times of India

(With inputs from Shivani Azad)

District-wise hectares destroyed by forest fires in 2019
From: Vineet Upadhyay, June 7, 2019: The Times of India

Crores spent on mitigation but forest fires still rage in U'khand

Large Swathes Of Jungles Devoured In Hill State, But Officials Have No Authority, Innovations Have Failed & Infra Remains Woefully Inadequate

Vinod Chand, 38, prayed as the fierce orange glow from a nearby forest inched closer. This was the third time this summer that the jungle near his village of Suryagaon, 30km from Nainital town, was on fire.

“No food was cooked in many houses that day. Firewood was scarce. Not everyone has an LPG cylinder here,” Chand told TOI as he recalled the forest fire that occured at the end of May.

This year has already seen 2,521 hectares of forests go up in smoke. Homes and livestock have been lost, and there’s been a spike in man-animal conflicts in the affected areas. The infernos continue to rage despite crores spent on mitigation and prevention. On May 28 alone, there were 94 forest fires spread over 161 hectares.

An Indian news website reported Mark Parrington, senior scientist with the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), saying: “Looking at the May monthly total fire radiative power, 2019 is second worst in 16 years after 2012.”

It’s a grim reminder that not much has changed since 4,538 hectares were gutted in 2016, the worst year on record. The menace of forest fires is not new. Since the formation of Uttarakhand in 2000, 44,518 hectares of forest land has been gobbled by fire. Yet, mitigation techniques have had little or no effect.

Measures to deal with the menace have often been inadequate. The chief conservator of forests (forest fires and disaster management) has remained toothless. The post was created after the devastating blazes of 2016, but a former official who held the position told TOI that he had “absolutely no authority to make a difference”. He said, “I had no power to make budgetary allocations, initiate surveys or research.” The state’s Forest Drone Force is stretched thin.

Apart from checking for illegal mining and poaching, the fleet of aerial vehicles has to watch out for the fires. “There are only five drones with us. And they are not dedicated solely to monitoring forest fires. How can five drones cover an entire state?” an official asked. Meanwhile, a service that allows the public to report forest fires has failed to take off. On May 28, 94 such incidents were reported, but toll-free numbers of the department that allow people to send alerts recorded only 15 calls.

A new service launched this year to allow citizens to send alerts to the forest department on social media has also received poor traction. User engagement is low. Barely 10 people bother to send alerts on their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram handles combined per week. Officials said the state’s difficult terrain makes fighting fire difficult. The response is slower and potential for fires to grow out of control is greater in remote areas where fire brigades cannot reach.

Climate change has compounded the problem. Shekhar Pathak, environmentalist and Padma Shri awardee, said rising temperatures and negligible winter rains have made the landscape drier and susceptible to fire. Research on wildfires in the US and Indonesia has established a link with climate change. Scientists in both the countries have found that with soaring heat, wildfires have increased over the past decades. The blazes are larger and the fire season now lasts longer.

Anup Sah, Nainital-based environmentalist and another Padma Shri awardee, said community forest management was essential to eliminate the threat of forest fires. “Roping in local residents as well as revival of natural water sources is key to protecting our forests.”

See also

Char Dham yatra

Dhari Devi (Char Dham)

Joshimath

Kedarnath

Uttarakhand: environment, ecology

Uttarakhand: Forest fires

Uttarakhand: Landslides, subsidence

Uttarakhand: Natural disasters

Forests: India