Palangka Raya Fire Team Anticipates Forest And Land Fires Approaching Residents' Settlements

Officers extinguished land fires in Palangka Raya City. (ANTARA/HO-BPBD Palangka Raya City)

PALANGKA RAYA - A joint team for handling forest and land fires in Palangka Raya City, Central Kalimantan, anticipates forest and land fires that are approaching residential areas.

"In the last few days, land fires have become increasingly rampant, even today forest and land fires are starting to approach residential areas. So the team immediately extinguished them so as not to threaten residents' houses," said Head of Preparedness at BPBD Palangka Raya City Heri Fauzi as reported by ANTARA, Friday, September 1.

He explained that the location of the land fire in the Jalan Merdeka area, Palangka Raya City, was not only close to settlements, but also close to one of the assistant community health service centers (puskesmas).

In fact, in a day land fires can occur in several different areas that are far apart. This condition is very difficult to handle because the concentration and strength of the fire team personnel will be divided.

The problem with handling land fires has also been increased and it is difficult for officers to get water sources. This situation occurs because the condition of the land is getting drier because in the last few days the "City of Beauty" area has not rained.

"As a result, currently the air conditions in Palangka Raya City are starting to be shrouded in light smoke. Especially in the morning and evening. The smell of smoke typical of land fires begins to smell," said Heri.

For this reason, his party appealed to all elements of society to jointly take steps to anticipate forest and land fires. At least around the neighborhood and land owned by each.

"Don't burn anything on the land. Most of the forest and land fires are thought to be strong due to land burning activities," he said.

If you see an incident of land burning or land fires, residents can immediately report to the relevant officers or agencies. This includes the Fairid Umi Siaga 112 central service.

His party is also aggressively carrying out socialization to the public through various ways to start utilizing social media, direct socialization or by distributing advisory leaflets.

In order to support the anticipation and handling of forest and land fires, the Palangka Raya City BPBD cooperates with a number of related parties involving hundreds of joint personnel in an effort to anticipate and deal with forest and land fires.

Currently, the Palangka Raya Police are also investigating the forest and land fire case that occurred in the local police jurisdiction, precisely at the fire of tens of hectares of land on Jalan Karya HApakat, Petuk Katimpun Village.

The Head of Ops for the Palangka Raya Police, Kompol Ganda B Napitupulu, said that his party would continue to carry out investigations so that later they could arrest the perpetrators of the land burners that occurred in their jurisdiction.

"Indeed, until now there have been no suspects in the forest and land fires case that have occurred in Palangka Raya at this time, but the Palangka Raya Police are still conducting an in-depth investigation regarding this matter," said Duda.