Massive forest fire expands in Japan, putting more homes at risk

A massive wildfire in northeastern Japan has expanded, with over 2,100 hectares burned since last week, putting more homes at risk, Kyodo News reported.As per Kyodo News on Tuesday, the fire in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, has forced residents to evacuate as the fire has spread over a wide area toward the Pacific coast.Kyodo News reported that Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba pledged during a parliamentary session to “deploy all firefighting and Self-Defense Forces (SDF) capabilities to prevent people’s homes from being impacted.”Kyodo News reported that firefighters recruited from across the country and SDF aircraft continued to battle the blaze after managing to prevent the flames from reaching residential areas of Ofunato on Sunday.As per Kyodo News, the forest fire is the biggest in Japan since the late 1980s, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency.Earlier on Sunday, Japan’s disaster management agency requested more fire departments across the country to join the battle against a forest fire that has continued to spread in the northeastern prefecture of Iwate.Significantly, nearly 1,700 firefighters from around 450 departments across the country had already joined the effort to control the blaze, which has spread over five days since Wednesday in Ofunato, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency.The agency has newly asked the governments of Hokkaido and Yokohama city to dispatch some of their firefighters to Ofunato.As per Kyodo News, while firefighters with aerial support from helicopters, including those of the Self-Defense Forces, have managed to keep the flames from spreading toward Ofunato’s residential areas along the Pacific coast, nearly 1,800 hectares of land had been burned as of Sunday, an increase of 400 hectares since the previous day.As per the statement issued by the Japanese Prime Minister’s Office on Friday, PM Ishiba convened a ministerial meeting regarding the forest fire in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture.He expressed his “heartfelt sympathy to all those affected by this disaster” and had informed that the government had committed an Emergency Fire Response Team and dispatched Self-Defense Force (SDF) units for disaster relief operations.He noted the establishment of an emergency response office in the Prime Minister’s Office within its crisis management center which will ensure the safety of all local residents by collecting and collating information on the disaster and coordinating emergency measures through collaboration by relevant organizations.The Japanese PM had informed that the he spoke to the Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications and the Minister of Defence to “continue to commit necessary SDF units and make all possible efforts in their firefighting operations, with firefighters and the SDF acting as one, so that the fire is extinguished at the earliest possible time.”The Prime Minister also highlighted the steps being taken towards rehabilitation, with a focus on those whose residences were damaged as a result of the fire and noted that coordination had already begun for the provision of emergency temporary housing. (ANI)