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![]() Saturday, March 21, 1998 Published at 07:38 GMT ![]() ![]() ![]() World: Americas ![]() Plea to tackle Amazon inferno ![]() Firefighters are ill-equipped to tackle the flames
The fires were started by subsistence farmers, who traditionally clear jungle areas for farmland by slashing and burning.
The firefighters are targeting the region of Apiau, but they are ill-equipped. They are using water containers, mops, sticks and "flappers" - shovel-sized flyswatters - to beat out the flames.
They are also equipped with chainsaws to cut firebreaks through the jungle.
That adds to the firefighters' problems. They cannot track the progress of the fire from the air, and dropping water from helicopters is useless because the dense forest canopy prevents the water hitting the ground.
Putting out the fire requires a lengthy, tree-by-tree examination to make sure big
trees are not smoldering on the inside.
The scorching heat - 122 degrees Fahrenheit (50 Celsius) near the fire - and humidity below 30% turn the vegetation into tinder.
Also under threat is the rainforest reserve of the Yanomami Indians, the world's largest Stone Age tribe.
But fire commander Wanius Amorim admitted he could not help the villagers. "The fires are approximately 13 to 18 miles (20 to 28 km) inside the Yanomami reservation," he said. "It's a smaller blaze that does not belong to the main fire as such."
But local people believe the government has done too little, too late. "The firemen should have been here two months ago and we wouldn't have to go through all this," said Endalva da Silva while queuing at a government emergency relief office.
It said the United Nations Office for Coordination of Human Affairs repeated the offer two weeks ago but never received a reply.
"We are appalled that the Brazilian government appears to have ignored this offer of assistance," Friends of the Earth said. "How much worse will the situation get before we see firm action?"
But a spokeswoman from the Brazilian environment ministry said that it had no record of such an offer being made.
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