Bush Fires Rage Near Brunei-Muara Schools, Homes
Bush Fires Rage Near Brunei-Muara Schools, Homes
20 March 2010
published by www.brudirect.com
Brunei — A Spate of bush fires raged near homes and schools across the district yesterday and the Fire and Rescue Department fought to keep the blazes under control throughout the day.
The Brunei Times was on the scene of one of the bush fires in Kg Mata-Mata, Gadong, which was in close proximity to the Katok Sixth Form Centre and overlooking a brand-new government housing estate.
It took firefighters from the Beribi Fire and Rescue Station half an hour to put out the flames, which were sparked by embers from a fire extinguished yesterday, directly across the narrow road.
The prolonged dry spell the country is undergoing as well as prevailing winds carrying flames further and faster across the dense shrub were being eyed for the sharp increase in the bush fires.
“We cannot be sure of the exact cause,” said a fireman on the scene, “but it’s so dry these days that anything such as a lit cigarette could start a fire.”
The Brunei Darussalam Meteorological Station (BDMS) confirmed the country should expect thee current dry weather to last until end of April.
The fireman told The Brunei Times that the Beribi Fire and Rescue Station had received two distress calls as of 6pm, the other reported blaze in Kg Bunut was due to open burning of rubbish.
The Muara Fire and Rescue Station confirmed another two fires, one near the Serasa Industrial Estate and the other close to the Sultan Umar All Saifuddin (SUAS) primary school, which took four hours to put out.
Eyewitnesses have also reported bushfires along the highway leading to Belait but The Brunei Times was unable to reach the Belait Fire and Rescue Station for confirmation.
On Thursday, a fire also broke out in Kg Sungai Besar, along Jln Kota Batu, coming dangerously close to homes and passing cars on the road nearby.
A resident of Kg Sungai Besar, Reza Abdullah, gave The Brunei Times a harrowing account of the events was sitting with my family on our balcony when we heard what we thought was the sound of running water. But it got louder and louder, so we went to see what was happening and that’s when we saw huge flames licking up the side of our house.”
Reza said that his father scrambled to get the hose, wetting the ground around their house in an attempt to prevent the fire spreading to their property.
By that point, my mother had already called the fire department and people from across the road came to try and stamp out the fire because it was inching near the road.”
He continued: “The fire had become so strong that it burnt through an electrical cable, causing a large red spark, and we suddenly lost the power supply to our house. Our neighbours also had no eke-tricky, and weren’t able to use their hose to douse the flames because an electrical pump carries the water up the hill.”
Reza said that two firefighters arrived on the scene within 20 minutes and they had the blaze under control within 10 minutes.
“The fire reached within five to 10 metres of our house. We were lucky that the wind was blowing away from our house otherwise it could have been a lot worse,” he said.
A BDMS forecast said the visibility rate in Brunei has been low for the past few days but the air quality as of yesterday was still considered good even when the visibility rate reached as low as 2.5km.
