Forest fire in military exercise zone under control
Fire brigade units of the Rescue Board were able to get a forest fire under control on Thursday evening that had broken out in a military exercise zone in the Kuusalu municipality in Harju County. Flights continued on Friday morning to assess the situation.
Though the fire was under control on Thursday evening, the Rescue Board continued flights on Friday morning to make sure it wouldn’t spread any further. The fire was put out with the help of an Antonov An-2 type plane of the Estonian Defence Forces (EDF).
As the press service of the North rescue center explained ERR, there could be explosives in the area, which is why the work was best done out of the air. The Rescue Board reported that they had been informed about the fire at 1:55 p.m. on Thursday.
The first units at the scene were out of Rakvere and Tapa in Lääne-Viru County, along with Kadrina’s voluntary fire brigade. According to their reports, an area of about 4 ha (just under 10 acres) of brushwood had caught on fire.
The Rescue Board had to assume that explosives were in the area, which made work to put out the fire difficult. Shortly after 10 p.m., the EDF plane called in to help finished its work putting out various fires across a total area of about 15 ha. According to the Rescue Board, the fire was most likely caused by ammunition discharged in the area.
Editor: Dario Cavegn
