Calabanga — Putting out forest fire is an emerging challenge for local governments and communities which has no equipment nor dedicated personnel for the task.
Take the current case of the huge fire that gutted about 100 to 150 hectares of second forest growth in the shoulders of Mount Isarog in the barangays of Harubay of Calabanga town and Canayunan of the municipality of Tinambac.
The forest fire, believed to have been started by the locals using illegal practice of kaingin system, burned hundreds of trees of hardwood species at the shoulders of Mt. Isarog in Camarines Sur over the weekend.
The forest fire reported to have started 1:00 P. M. Saturday was put out by the concerted efforts of employees from the provincial disaster management council and volunteers from the community.
Barangay Harubay chairperson Edencia Orlina related that the provincial employees and volunteers did the job by studying the direction of the wind and the fire and preempted its spread through simple clearing of the vulnerable area.
There was no report yet on whether a response was made from the Legazpi city-based regional office of civil defense. (with PNA report by John Mark Escandor)
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The community volunteers are the true heroes. When we arrived at Harubay on the afternoon of last Saturday, we found people milling around very,very willing to go into action. In fact I was informed that a few of them have already been to the site to see what they can do but were forced to go back because of the expanse of the conflagration. With the good barangay captain of Harubay, we simply all the able bodied and willing to form three teams. After I have given the orientation on basic forest fire fighting, the teams proceeded with nothing but bolos and possibly a lot of prayers .We again formed another three smaller teams ( three persons each) that served as the supply support groups which carried the necessary follow-up provisions. Others started cooking. During the night, the teams rreturned one by one with the reports that the fires have been put out. While we are busy doing that in Harubay, another teams are doing almost exactly the same in Cawaynan and Lupi in Tinambac where a much bigger fire occurred. In the lead teams were two female forest officers from the EDMERO .
If not for these volunteers, a larger portion of MINP could have been damaged. They deserve to be recognized.
@Mr. Rivero:Thanks for the information. Kudos to all of you volunteers and concerned personnel !!!
The town’s fire protection bureau has no fire truck of its own.