Forest Fire in Odisha

Forest Fire in Odisha

Subject : Environment

Section: Biodiversity

Context: Odisha has seen more than 200 cases of forest fires since the beginning of the year, with the latest one in a reserve forest at Anantapur village.

More on the News:

• There have been 1,151 fire incidents in the state from January 1 to February 7, according to the SNPP-VIIRS monitoring system, the Forest Survey of India’s (FSI) website noted.
• Last year, there were just 405 fire incidents for the same period, according to the SNPP-VIIRS monitoring system. This is a 284 per cent increase in the number of fire incidents for the same period.
• Odisha have not received any rainfall since November. It has been more than three months of dry spell. State mostly have deciduous forests with majorly Sal trees, their dry leaves are falling and getting accumulated on the forest floor which is leading to ground fires as the temperatures are rising.

Forest Fire:

• Forest fires, also called wildfires and bush or vegetation fires, are described as uncontrolled, often widespread burning of plants in forests, grasslands, brushland, and tundra.
• Types of Forest Fires:
  • Surface fires– easiest fires to control and cause the least damageas they burn only surface plant litter.
  • Ground fires– also called ‘underground’ or ‘subsurface fires’, burn within humus, peat, and piles of vegetationthat are dry enough to burn. Although such fires spread very slowly, they are often difficult to suppress or fully extinguish, which makes them dangerous.
  • Crown fires– most intense and dangerousforest fires as they burn whole trees and can spread rapidly by spreading across tree tops due to winds.
  • The UNEP report provides a new classificationfor forest fires – landscape fires and
• Landscape firesare defined as being seasonal, of moderate intensity (with few instances of high intensity), easily controlled, and having a low environmental impact (for some species it may even have a positive impact).
• Wildfires are defined as extreme events, of high intensity, that are difficult to control, and have severe social, economic, and environmental impacts.

Efforts to protect forests from fire:

• In 2004, the FSI developed the Forest Fire Alert Systemto monitor forest fires in real time.
• In its advanced version launched in January 2019, the system now uses satellite information gathered from NASA and ISRO.
• The real-time fire information from identified fire hotspots is gathered using MODIS sensors(1km by 1km grid) and electronically transmitted to FSI.

What needs to done:

• Creation and maintenance of fire lines in forest areas, engagement of fire watchers, creation of water storage structures, strengthening of forest infrastructure, procurement of firefighting equipment, soil and moisture conservation in high risk areas, awareness creation and incentivizing villages / communities for protection against forest fires.