Keonjhar: Authorities have initiated measures to prevent cases of forest fires in this division that cause massive ecological and economic losses to the biosphere.

Outbreak of forest fire has become an annual phenomenon in the forested areas of Keonjhar district, especially in summer. As temperature soars, standing trees shed dry leaves and these leaves have often turned out to be potential source of fire outbreak, said forest officials.

"A standard operating procedure is being followed to prevent forest fires. Special squads consisting of ground-level forest workers have been deployed to keep vigil in the dense forest to stop fire outbreak. They are being provided fire blowers to douse flames," said divisional forest officer Santosh Joshi.

"Fire protection check posts manned by forest guards are being installed in the fire-prone pockets. The fire protection squads would be on the jobs with motorcycles, along with fire blowers, to gain access to the motorable forested areas. With vehicles and blowers at their disposals, forest department personnel could easily rush to douse forest fire," he said.

"People living on the fringes of forest play a key role in checking forest fires. It's these villages which get whiff of fire before the forest personnel could come to know of it. As forest wealth is a permanent livelihood source for them, people from these forest-side villages need to get involved in the fire fighting," he said.

The forest department is organising awareness programme to sensitise the local villagers to curb forest fire. "Prompt response and early dissemination of alert information are vital to save the forest from fire destruction. Often, the squads are informed of the fire at conflagrated stage. So it becomes an uphill task to tame the inferno," said an official.

The fire-induced loss to forest wealth is immense and irreparable. The timber species besides fruit-bearing tress are gutted. It takes years for trees to grow up. But spark could reduce the forest wealth within minutes. Fire also destroys wildlife and its habitat. Nests and eggs of ground dwelling birds are lost. Reptiles also lose their young ones because of forest fires.