Peatland Fire Engulfs One Hectare in Pekanbaru's Air Hitam
A forest and land fire has engulfed around one hectare of peatland in Air Hitam subdistrict, Payung Sekaki district, Pekanbaru City, Riau. The blaze, which has been burning for the past two days, has forced firefighting teams to work extra hard to tackle flames burning both on the surface and underground.
Head of the Sumatra Forest Fire Control Centre, Ferdian Krisnanto, confirmed the fire occurred on other-use area (APL) land. The vegetation burnt is dominated by ferns, shrubs, and oil palm plants.
“The estimated burnt area is around one hectare. On the first day of operations, the team managed to extinguish about 0.3 hectares. However, by the afternoon the fire status was still not out, so the extinguishing process continued,” Ferdian stated on Thursday (9/7).
The firefighting effort involves a joint team comprising Manggala Agni Daops IV/Pekanbaru, the Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD), the Fire Department, the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI), and the Indonesian National Police (Polri). Operations on the first day ran from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. local time, focusing on chasing the fire front to prevent it from spreading.
The team deployed one Mini Striker pump unit with a single hose lay pattern. Several other supporting tools were also utilised.
Ferdian explained that water availability was actually sufficient, sourced from a nearby canal two metres wide and one metre deep. However, the characteristics of the peatland posed the main challenge for personnel.
“Because the fire occurred on peatland with both sub-surface and surface fire types, the extinguishing process became more difficult, requiring continued handling,” he clarified.
Weather conditions at the site were observed to be clear to partly cloudy with low wind speeds of around four kilometres per hour. Despite the light winds, officers remain on full alert to ensure the fire does not spread to a wider area.
The Forest Fire Control Centre emphasised that all involved parties will continue extinguishing and cooling efforts until the fire is declared completely out.