A fire that is a forest disaster in Bolivia | E …

A forest fire destroyed more than 460,000 hectares of forest and grbadland in the tourist area of ​​Chiquitania (central and eastern Bolivia) and in a nature reserve in the Santa Cruz region. The governor of this region, Rubén Costas, said that the state of "departmental disaster" had more resources and facilitated a coordinated action with the national government.

"468,904 hectares of forest were affected," Costas said after flying over the area burned by Defense Minister Javier Zabaleta. Because of the scale of the fire, Zabaleta said that "the entire military garrison" of Santa Cruz, considered the economic engine of Bolivia, had been "put into play".

After evaluating the number of hectares destroyed, the governor declared the state of "departmental disaster" in the most affected municipalities: Roboré and San Ignacio de Velasco. In addition to the hundreds of brigades fighting ground fire, the defense minister confirmed that two helicopters were operating from the air. "We can reach five helicopters between today and tomorrow," Zabaleta said.

In Roboré, where the major fire broke out, government firefighter trainers, volunteer firefighters, municipal technicians, military and civilian defense personnel are working to protect communities that may be affected.

San Ignacio de Velasco, part of the Chiquitania – one of the main tourist areas of Bolivia where Jesuit missions declared as UNESCO heritage are located – was another of the most devastated cities.

Fire control work is also being carried out in the cities of San Rafael, Charagua, Concepción, San Matías and San José de Chiquitos.

Another fire outbreak spread Saturday of about 600 hectares around Viru Viru International Airport. However, this goal was quickly stifled, according to the Bolivian Airports Service (Sabsa).

According to Minister Zabaleta, there are still 7,024 sources of burning in the area. The historical average for the month of August, said the official, "is 4,688 burns", so this year they "are about to double that number". In addition, according to their estimates, "70% of the department (of Santa Cruz) is threatened because of the low humidity of the vegetation".

Governor Costas has estimated that most of these fires "are caused by men" by burning rubbish in the cities or by "eacho", an ancient agrarian practice of burning vegetation to prepare farmland and pastures. Another factor that influences, for the official, are the gusts of wind of 80 or 90 kilometers at the time recorded in Santa Cruz, with which "there is no human power that can l 39; ;Stop".

"The situation is very worrying, I would say very serious," said Governor Costas. And he concluded: "You can not play with fire, you can not risk natural resources, human lives, all this is such an important heritage that we have tried and we will continue to defend."

Bolivian President Evo Morales said on Twitter that national authorities are constantly monitoring the fires in Santa Cruz and asking "the people to cooperate and to respect all the preventive measures".