Fire erupts in Nawabshah’s Pai Forest, engulfs hundreds trees

NAWABSHAH: Fire has erupted in Pai Forest near Sakrand and engulfed hundreds of trees in the woodland, quoting rescue sources ARY News reported on Wednesday.

The officials at the Pai Forest have failed to control the raging fire, which is rapidly spreading. Fire tenders have been called from other parts of the district to control and extinguish the blaze, according to rescue sources.

The fire could result in loss of precious trees, plants and saplings in the forest, local people said. “Hundreds precious trees have burnt in the raging fire so far,” according to local people.

An incident of fire in Pai Forest is not for first time, in an earlier incident in the same

woodland in April 2009 several trees were gutted to ash. In a previous fire incident officials had claimed that fire burnt down trees on at least five to six acres of the land. The forest fire affected trees of eucalyptus, babol and Kandi over five acres, according to a report.

The Pai Forest, once flourishing woodland, was originally spread over an area of 5,901 acres. Subsequently an area of over one thousand acres was transferred to the department of agriculture.

Sindh is almost deprived of all its forest cover, as centuries-old forests on both sides of the River Indus have been eliminated and converted into agriculture lands and occupied by the influential of the area.