Russia's Far East sees over 300-fold growth of wildfires in past 24 hours
KHABAROVSK. Aug 9 (Interfax) - About 40 forest fires have broken out in Russia's Far East in the past 24 hours and roughly 207,500 hectares of forests have been destroyed; the fires burned 676 hectares of forests the day before, the forestry department of the Far Eastern Federal District said in a report.
The region had 102 fires in all, mostly in Yakutia. Fires were also observed in the Chukchi autonomous region and the Khabarovsk territory.
The fires were fought by about 1,400 men, 193 vehicles, and three aircraft.
Ten fires were put out and 16 were contained in Yakutia as of Wednesday morning, the report said.
The Far East has seen 1,761 forest fires across more than 1.7 million hectares since the beginning of this wildfire season, the forestry department said. Yakutia was harmed most: 1.2 million hectares of forest was destroyed by the blaze there.