New Delhi: After 11 days, the forest fires inside Goa’s wildlife sanctuaries were finally controlled on Tuesday. According to The Times of India, officials of the Union environment ministry and National Disaster Management Authority held meetings with forest officials in Goa, advising them to assess the areas that saw fires and take corrective measures.
At 10 pm on Tuesday night, Goa forest minister Vishwajit Rane tweeted that no more fires had been reported at the time. “To keep an eye, about 300 employees and volunteers have been deployed,” he added.
The Member, NDMA, and Additional Secretary, NDMA, advised @goaforests to assess the area affected by fires and take corrective measures at the earliest. State Government will prepare a comprehensive Forest Fire Management Plan to prevent and manage forest fires.@PMOIndia
— VishwajitRane (@visrane) March 14, 2023
Rane also thanked local populations for their efforts in helping to douse the flames.
We are grateful to the youth of Tisk Usgao who wholeheartedly volunteered to assist the @goaforests dept over the past four days in putting out the fire in Pilye Dharbandora.
Conservation of forests is a collective effort both by the government and the community. pic.twitter.com/Y0x7clh06l
— VishwajitRane (@visrane) March 14, 2023
According to The New Indian Express, the fire has damaged a vast stretch of area in the Mahadayi Wildlife Sanctuary, located on the Karnataka-Goa border. The Goa government had earlier teamed up with authorities in Karnataka to fight the fire.
Indian Navy choppers too had been called in to help with the efforts. In a tweet on Wednesday, the Indian Navy’s Goa Naval Area said, “Continued efforts towards helping state administration to control the raging forest fires in Goa, the helicopters of #IndianNavy flew multiple missions on 08 Mar and sprayed appx 17 tons of water at Cortalim and Morlem.”
The cause of the fire is yet to be ascertained, Herald Goa reported.
Last week, the Goa forest department had set up a 24×7 control room for real-time monitoring of the fires. As many as 48 fire spots were detected in the last 11 days.
A release from the Press Information Bureau said that elongated dry spell may have been responsible for the multiple fires. “Long dry-spell (almost no rains since mid-October, 2022), coupled with unprecedented high summer temperature with low humidity has resulted in a conducive atmosphere for fire, which has been aggravated by high winds observed in the past couple of weeks, particularly after sundown.”
“It appears that the fires are mostly man-made in nature, cause of which may be inadvertent or otherwise, for which enquiry has been intiated [sic]. The spread has further been aided due to unprecedented high temperature and high winds,” it continued.