FIRE FIGHTING UNITS TO BE NEWLY ESTABLISHED IN SOUMS

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ Fire fighting units will be newly established in Bayan-Undur soum of Orkhon aimag, Khatgal village of Alag-Erdene soum of Khovsgol aimag, Zereg soum of Hovd aimag as well as a search and rescue unit in Erdenedalai soum, Dundgobi province. The Government made this decision considering the high risks of forest, steppe and indoor fires and number of the population, entities and companies of these soums. Fire fighting unit with 4th class has to have 47 employees, but the staff number of the new units has been set to be 39, taking into account the economic difficulties. In the first five months of this year, forest and steppe fires occurred 138 times, affecting 31 thousand hectares of forest and 3.2 million hectares of land with ecological loss of over MNT 10 billion and material loss of MNT 1 billion. Four people died, four people were burned, 41 houses and gers, 64 livestock sheds, 6143 heads of livestock and other things were damaged. Over the same period, indoor fires occurred 1792 times, causing an estimated loss of MNT6 billion. These fires claimed 22 people’s lives, 19 were burned and 822 heads of animals were killed, 764 houses and homes were burned. Rescuers and firefighters were able to save 462 lives and prevent property worth of MNT10 billion from catching fires. Due to the social and economic situation, only 42 soums out of 330 soums of 21 aimags have firefighting units and Ulaanbaatar has 14 units. B.Ooluun