‘320 fire incidents occurred in Margalla Hills Park in last 17 years, trees over 500 acres gutted’

Islamabad: As many as 320 fire incidents occurred in the protected Margalla Hills National Park in last seventeen years in which tree cover measuring over 500 acres were damaged despite prompt steps taken by the civic agency.

According to the official record of the Capital Development Authority (CDA), 75 percent of forest fires lasted for 1-4 hours; 15 percent of fires prolonged for 4-8 hours; very few forest fires of only one percent carried on for a day or more than 24 hours.

The data showed that the most 71 fire incidents occurred in the Margallah Hills National Park in 2003 while 62 and 41 such incidents happened in 2003 and 2006 respectively.

An official said given the past record of the fire incidents number of fire pickets was increased from 15 to 30 in 2016 and fire tenders along with 50 officials of emergency and disaster management were also deputed at Pir Sohawa to work in different shifts.

“We are evolving new strategy to avoid fire incidents in the Margallah Hills during the summer season. The scorching heat in the peak summer season often causes fire incidents so we will focus on strict monitoring mechanism to keep vigil over the situation in this respect,” he said.