BNPB: Joint Teams Extinguish Forest and Land Fires in East and South Kalimantan

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) has confirmed that joint teams successfully extinguished hotspots from forest and land fires (karhutla) that struck three areas in East Kalimantan and South Kalimantan provinces over the past two days.

Head of the BNPB Data, Information, and Disaster Communication Centre Abdul Muhari in Jakarta on Monday explained that the first incident occurred in Empas Village, Melak Subdistrict, West Kutai Regency, East Kalimantan, on Sunday (26/4) afternoon.

“An area of 1.5 hectares was affected in the incident. The fire was fully extinguished by the joint team led by the local BPBD, and it was reported that there were no casualties,” he said.

On the same day, karhutla also struck Senaken Village, Tanah Grogot Subdistrict, Paser Regency, East Kalimantan. Joint teams from BPBD, the Fire Department, volunteers, and the Fire Care Community (MPA) faced challenges during the extinguishing process.

“The dense scrub, dry alang-alang, and strong winds at the location initially hampered the teams. However, the 1-hectare area that burned was successfully extinguished on the same day,” he stated.

Although parts of Indonesia still have potential for extreme weather, BNPB reminds local governments to remain alert to the potential for karhutla.

Based on Monday’s monitoring of the topsoil burnability level, North Sumatra, Papua, and South Papua are in the easy to very easy to burn category.

“Early prevention is the most effective step to avoid the spread of burned areas. We ask for active community participation in protecting forests and conducting patrols together with village officials,” said Abdul Muhari.

He emphasised that controlling karhutla depends on the speed of response at the grassroots level so that fire locations do not develop into large fires that are difficult to control.