BNPB Assistance Helicopter Arrives In Pekanbaru Handling Karhutla

One unit of the Sikorsky S61N water bombing helicopter assistance from the Indonesian National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) arrived in Pekanbaru, to support forest and land fire extinguishing activities in Riau that have hit parts of the Riau area.

"Some areas in Riau have experienced forest and land fires, but there are forest and land fires that are difficult to extinguish by land, so they need extinguishing by air, namely by helicopter," said Head of the Riau Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD), M Edy Afrizal, as reported by ANTARA, Tuesday, May 9.

The water bombing helicopter has the ability to fly for 4.5 hours for a long time in an effort to extinguish fires in difficult areas to reach.

The existence of the helicopter will conduct water bombings on forest and land fires in Dumai due to the limited number of officers from the Riau land forest and land fire task force which has made it difficult for them to reach the location of the fire.

"The fire can be more widespread because it is triggered by strong winds and summer, but the presence of water helicopters will help reduce the impact of the fire," he said.

As an effort to overcome forest and land fires (karhutla) in Riau province, especially in coastal areas of Riau province. Until now, Weather Modification Technology (TMC) efforts have been made by seeding salt in the sky of Riau province.

Edy said that TMC activities in Riau had been carried out for the past week. Currently, Riau Province has received 20 tons of salt assistance for TMC.

"We received 20 tons of salt for TMC, so far 9 tons have been smeared in Riau's skies," he said.

TMC activities in Riau are mostly carried out in the sky around the coastal areas of Riau because the rainfall has decreased at that location and there has also been a forest and land fires, namely Dumai City and Bengkalis Regency.

Therefore, he said, TMC is focused a lot on the coastal areas of Riau, because the rainfall is minimal and there is the potential for forest and land fires to occur.