Wildfires devastate Brazil's parks
Copyright 2000, Associated Press
August 27, 2000
Firefighters working overnight had managed by Saturday to largely put out a wildfire that destroyed a third of one of Brazil's major national parks, park authorities said.
The fire, which began two days ago, burned 50,000 acres of forested highland savanna in Chapada dos Veadeiros National Park in central Brazil, said park director Rosalia Gonbim de Castro. Only scattered patches of flames remained, she said.
To the south, two fires in the Serra da Canastra National Park were extinguished Friday after firefighters battled the flames for eight days, said Valdo Veloso, spokesman for Brazil's Environmental Protection Agency. The fires destroyed 36,000 acres of savanna, one-fifth of the park's 179,000 acres, he said.
The blazes were the latest in a rash of fires fed by a searing dry season that have decimated Brazil's biologically important tropical savannas.
The savanna region — characterized by hilly grasslands dotted by shrubs and gnarled trees — is tinder-dry after an especially severe dry season, and officials fear more fires in coming weeks.
"There is a huge mass of dry grass and leaves in these parks that fuel the fires and cause them to spread extremely rapidly," said Paulo Cesar Mendes Ramos, chief of fire prevention for Brazil's national parks.
Scientists will evaluate the impact of the fires to wildlife in the next several weeks, Ramos said. The savanna parks are home to several endangered species, including the lobo guara — known in English as the savanna wolf — the jaguar and several bird species.
Investigators believe the fire in Chapada dos Veadeiros National Park was started by arsonists or someone illegally burning forest near a road on the park's fringe, Brazil's Environmental Protection Agency said in a press release. A criminal investigation has been launched, it said.
The savanna region contains one-third of Brazil's plant and animal species, according to the Brazilian branch of the World Wildlife Fund. The organization estimated that only 30 percent of the original savanna that covered much of central Brazil remains.