Pine Forest Cluster Near Geumgangsong Faces 'Wildfire'... Forestry Authorities "All-Out Effort to Prevent Damage"

Daewang Pine located in the Geumgang Pine forest. Provided by Korea Forest Service

[Asia Economy (Uljin) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] As the forest fire in Uljin, Gyeongbuk continues for the fifth day, the fire has spread near the Geumgang Pine forest, prompting the forestry authorities to make every effort to prevent damage.

According to the Central Forest Fire Prevention Headquarters of the Korea Forest Service on the 7th, the fire has spread to within 500 meters of Sogwang-ri, Seomyeon, Uljin-gun, where the Geumgang Pine forest is located.

The Uljin Geumgang Pine forest is the only domestic breeding protection forest established in 1959, with about 85,000 Geumgang Pines over 200 years old distributed across 1,600 hectares of forest around Sogwang-ri.

In particular, the Geumgang Pines in the Sogwang-ri pine forest are known for their excellent wood quality and high preservation value, having been used in the restoration of Sungnyemun, National Treasure No. 1, after the 2008 fire.

However, the Sogwang-ri pine forest area has narrow paths and steep slopes, making ground access difficult when the fire spreads, and the water reservoirs are far, making it challenging for firefighting helicopters to carry out extinguishing operations, according to forestry authorities. If the fire spreads further, significant damage is inevitable.

Accordingly, the forestry authorities have deployed 252 forest fire fighters in 16 teams focusing on key ground areas to block the fire from approaching Sogwang-ri.

They have also installed mobile water tanks to reduce the water refill time for firefighting helicopters.

Currently, 51 firefighting helicopters equipped with fire retardants (31 from forestry, 13 from defense, 4 from fire services, 2 from police, and 1 from the national park) are deployed in the Sogwang-ri pine forest area to prevent the fire from spreading.

Nam Tae-heon, Deputy Director of the Korea Forest Service, said, “We plan to mobilize all available ground and aerial firefighting resources to extinguish the fire,” adding, “Since the Sogwang-ri pine forest in Uljin represents a forest symbolic of our country, we will do our best to prevent it from being damaged by the fire.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.