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Protected forest in Balikpapan burned down
Under threat: Wildfire is sweeping across the Wain River Protected Forest in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, threatening protected animals and plants and edging closer to Camp Djamaluddin, a research station in the middle of the forest
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Under threat: Wildfire is sweeping across the Wain River Protected Forest in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, threatening protected animals and plants and edging closer to Camp Djamaluddin, a research station in the middle of the forest. (tempo.co) (tempo.co)
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span class="inline inline-center">Under threat: Wildfire is sweeping across the Wain River Protected Forest in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, threatening protected animals and plants and edging closer to Camp Djamaluddin, a research station in the middle of the forest. (tempo.co)
Fires are destroying the Wain River Protected Forest in the northern part of Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, and were approaching Camp Djamaludin, a research station in the center of the primary forest, on Tuesday afternoon, locals have reported.
The HLSW Management Agency and local residents strove to extinguish the fires, which have been burning since Saturday, but fire spots continued to spring up, they said.
'We don't know where the fires came from, and how many hectares of protected forest have been burned down,' said Nunuk Kasiyanto, a local resident living near Wain River, on Tuesday.
As of Tuesday afternoon, local authorities were still deploying personnel to help extinguish the fires.
Nunuk said around 150 military personnel from the 900 Raiders Battalion and a number of students from conservation groups in Samarinda had been deployed to help fight the fires. A long list of parties was reportedly working together to put out the fires, including HLSW management personnel, local residents and dozens of members of youth organizations, such as Pemuda Pancasila. They all had been involved in the fire extinguishing efforts since Saturday, Nanuk said.
Camp Djamaluddin, the research station in the middle of the 10-million-year-old primary forest, is mainly accessed via a 2-hour walk from an entrance gate near the Wain Dam. The Wain River Protected Forest is part of Karang Joang and Kariangau sub-districts in West Balikpapan district, Balikpapan, East Kalimantan. The protected forest is 9,782 hectares in size.
The western part of the forest borders on the Gulf of Balikpapan while in the east it ends at the Soekarno-Hatta highway, between the 20-kilometer point of the road and the 24 km point.
The Wain River Protected Forest is home to a number of protected animals and plants, such as East Kalimantan orangutans and sun bears, Proboscis monkeys, crocodiles, hundreds of bird species, dozens of Orchid species and tropical pitcher plants.
The protected forest, which was set up during the Dutch colonial era, is also the water catchment area for residents of Balikpapan. (ebf)(+)
