Burning about 100 hectares of forest in Hoang Lien National Park

After 4 days, the fire in Hoang Lien National Park (Lao Cai) burned about 100 hectares of forest. The control of fire still faces many difficulties due to the inability to use fire-fighting means and machines.

In the evening of March 5, present at the fire site in Hoang Lien National Park, Deputy General Director of Forestry Department Ha Cong Tuan said that the fire-prone area does not have an area of ​​cultivators but this is where people have growing and drying cardamom.

'The fire has burned about 100 hectares of regenerated forest after the 1998 fire, not yet burned into the natural forest,' Tuan said.

Fire at a high altitude, terrain is difficult to work
extinguish fire almost by human power. (Photo: Lao Cai Newspaper)

According to Mr. Tuan, the most difficult task of fire fighting at this time is to take 2-4 hours to reach the site due to walking to the fire points at altitudes above 1,600 meters. The rugged terrain also made it impossible for forces to deploy specialized water pumps and fire fighting equipment. A transceiver station of the Military Telecom Corporation (Viettel) has been installed so that the fire fighting force can contact and coordinate.

Meanwhile, according to the Lao Cai newspaper, at a height of 1,900 meters, where the border between Seo My Ty village and Den Thang village (Ta Van commune), the fire was quite large because the area had many ferns. Firefighting method is done completely by hand, using fire power, using shoulder sprays or carrying water on the stubborn trees, and using gasoline saws to cut down wooden trees to limit processing far-flung sources of fire.

High winds, sky-high due to the western low pressure are expanding and the terrain is difficult and some areas of regenerating forests have many ferns, so some fires are inaccessible or cannot be stamped. Therefore, the firefighting force has accepted to cut off some of the regenerated forest flanges to make fire-resistant roads.

According to estimates of Mr. Thao A Seng, Head of the Forest Protection Department in Sa Pa district, the fire resistance road is about 1km longer. By the afternoon of March 5, there were nearly 1,500 turns of people participating in the fire suppression and the militia force continued to be mobilized and strengthened.

Making fire resistant roadways. (Photo: Lao Cai Newspaper)

Before that, at noon 2/3, the fire was discovered in the forest near the Na Hang stream fork in Seo My Ty village (Ta Van commune, Sapa, Lao Cai). Area of ​​burnt forest is in Hoang Lien National Park - Sapa. This garden is located in 6 upland communes of Sapa and Tan Uyen districts (Lai Chau), about 30,000 hectares wide, recognized as ASEAN Heritage Garden in 2003.

According to the Forest Protection Department, on March 5, 11 provinces (mainly the North West and the Central Highlands) are alerting forest fires at level 5 - extremely dangerous, if forest fires will spread very quickly. The number of fire points also skyrocketed compared to the previous days. Many provinces have a large number of fire points such as Son La (nearly 200 points), Dien Bien (more than 120), Lai Chau (more than 70) .