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Firefighter Chief Pvt. Wahyudi promoted posthumously
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Forest fire emergency unit commander Brig. Gen. Nurendi (right) and Rokan Hilir Regent H. Suyatno (second right) search on Aug. 22 for First Pvt. Wahyudi, who went missing while attempting to extinguish a fire in an oil palm plantation in Riau province. (Courtesy of Korem 031 Wira Bima/-)
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irst Pvt. Wahyudi, a member of Detachment Rudal/004 Dumai, was posthumously promoted to the rank of chief private by the state to honor his service while fighting forest fires last week.
The commander of a forest fire emergency task unit in Riau, Brig. Gen. Nurendi, said the honor was bestowed because Wahyudi died on duty. “Fighting a forest fire is an honorable duty because it is the mandate from the state for the public,” he said on Wednesday, while sending off Wahyudi’s body at Sultan Syarif Kasim Airport in Pekanbaru.
Wahyudi will be buried in his hometown of Magetan, East Java.
Wahyudi went missing on Thursday last week when he was fighting a fire in Bangko, Rokan Hilir regency, Riau. He was with two friends on Thursday at 3 p.m., trying to replace a fire extinguisher with a bigger one. He returned to the forest to fetch a hose they had left in an oil palm plantation.
After some time, his friends started to worry and called him. Wahyudi told them he was climbing a large tree 100 meters from the water source that they had used to extinguish the fire. But when his friends reached the tree, he was not there. They called him again, and Wahyudi said he was trapped in the middle of the burning plantation. They searched but could not find him.
Wahyudi had been deployed for two weeks before he went missing. His body was found on Tuesday, not far from the tree he said he had climbed. (evi)
