To reinforce the Forest Fire Protection Operation During this summer season, the Society of Forest Producers (SPF) invested in 15 cameras with artificial intelligence that will monitor the coastal fieldsreported to The Observer Nelson Ledesma, president of the SPF.
Courtesy: José Ribeiro, Regional Fire Chief of Zone VI
Forest fires are a great concern for producers, given the economic losses. At the beginning of 2022, 22,000 hectares were burned in Paysandú and Río Negro.
Daily flights
In Durazno, the Monitoring and Dispatch Centera unified control base in which the images of those 15 cameras will be worked on plus those taken by planes and helicopters that fly over the fields, and the notices that arrive by telephone.
In Durazno, a unified control base was installed where all forest fire alerts arrive.
The SPF has five spotlight area detection paths. In the same, five small planes carry out daily flights (up to three per day) to monitor the properties and identify possible sources of fire. Three heliported bases are also used that can give “a rapid response” when detecting an outbreak, which operate from December to April. And there are three vehicles with the necessary fuel to carry the cargo for the helicopters to the combat points.
To carry out the control operation, they are also used watchtowers in Tacuarembó and Riveraareas of the country with a great preponderance of forestry production.
With a mapping system, the situation of the fields is monitored in the summer season, when there are more forest fires.
Control in 900 thousand hectares
Within the framework of the fire prevention operation, emergencies are managed under the Incident Command System (SCI), the same one used by the National Fire Department, indicated from the SPF.
The management of these emergencies is carried out with a software that maps the riskboth climatic and by combustion action.
For the 2022/23 prevention campaign, aero-agricultural planes were incorporated as a “combat resource”, which will be loaded with water and will operate from runways near the forests in case a fire breaks out.
Five small planes carry out daily flights to monitor the situation of the forested fields and identify possible sources of fire.
More than 80 member companies of the SPF participate in the investment that covers 900,000 hectares of forests (close to 90% of the implanted forests).
“We have been doing it for several years, and we have been improving the annual investment,” he said. Directly or indirectly approximately 100 people participate in prevention operations every summer.
