Forest Fires Rippling Across Yakutia, Russia's Largest & Coldest Region; 20,000 Hectares & Counting

[hatrack]

Even school children are in firefighting brigades in some areas of Yakutia. Two school boys aged 13 and 15 were seen working on the edge of a wildfire threatening their home village of Ynakhsyt, Nyurbinsky district in northwestern Yakutia. Local authorities tried to deny teenagers were involved, but later admitted parents allowed them to work alongside firefighters and volunteers.

The number of the wildfires in the Nyurbinsky district grew so fast due to a long spell of hot, windy and dry weather that a state of emergency was announced in the area, with calls for extra help in both manpower and equipment. Residents of at least two villages had to evacuate as wildfires got too close to their homes.

The republic’s authorities were accused of downplaying statistics on wildfires by a factor of between ten and twenty by Russia’s Federal Ministry of Nature. ‘The Republic of Yakutia claims that wildfires in Nyurbinsky district burn across 1,057 hectares, while our data shows that it’s over 20,000 hectares’, a statement from the Ministry of Nature said.

Videos from Nyurbinsky district show local residents helplessly attempting to stop crown fires from the ground, then retreating as a mighty wall of fire towers in front of them.

Devastating damage to wildlife by summer-2021 wildfires in Yakutia. Picture: Ykt.top


EDIT

https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/russias-largest-and-coldest-region-is-on-fire-again-and-this-year-wildfires-strike-early/