A season of special fire risk was announced in the Prioksko-Terrasniy Reserve. The safety department is turned into the special work regime. The staff operates regular patrol checks on the territory of the reserve and the buffer zone to find fire outbreaks in their initial stage when it is easy to put them out.

In April, 2016 alone eight fire outbreaks were discovered and extinguished in the buffer zone outside the reserve. All of them were caused by people staying in the forest or by the nearest ponds and rivers.

Unfortunately, the human factor remains the main reason for most fire outbreaks. That’s why the administration of the Prioksko-Terrasniy Reserve asks all the visitors to be very careful. Campfires are strictly prohibited on the territory of the reserve and its buffer zone.

All the following can cause a forest fire:

A wrong place for the campfire as well as its incorrect construction, carelessness and wrong way to extinguish the campfire.

Smoking in the forest. Even a seemingly well extinguished cigarette butt could work as a fire trigger if thrown at dry mossy ground in a dry season.

Hunting rifle shooting and flare launching in arid weather. When it lands on a suitable combustible material, a smoking rifle wad (made either of paper or felt) acts as a lighted cigarette butt. A high wind often throws off a signal flare before it is completely burnt.

Glass (or transparent plastic) waste left in the forest. If water gets inside a left glass jar or a bottle, it creates a kind of converging lens effect due to the bottle or jar’s rounded form. The same lens effect can be achieved with just a convex fragment of a jar or a bottle large enough.

Sparkles from exhaust pipes belonging to the machinery with a combustion engine. If an engine of a car, a tractor or a chainsaw is untuned, its scorching sparkles can cause a fire.

Grass burning in back yards. Not all the farmers who burn dry grass and plants tops and scorch wastelands can control the fire, when it is windy in particular.

Remember! A casual fire handling may have disastrous effects.