Mangaluru, Mar 27: Amid fear of coronavirus spread, the District Collector on Friday ordered the closure of the city’s major fishing area Dhakke.
''The fish caught by us on Wednesday were dumped, without being sold'', fishermen said. Meanwhile, a few them obtained police permission and took the fish to the nearby fish mill.
All the boats which had gone for fishing are back to the dock and the port is deserted. Also, the fishermen who went fishing have been advised to return.
Udupi, Jun 20: The wife and daughter of a 54-year-old man who succumbed to Covid-19, tested positive for the virus on Saturday.
Sources said that the family returned to Udupi on June 18 and the man died the same day while his wife and daughter tested positive today.
The man and his family had arrived at their house in Thekkatte on Thursday, June 18 afternoon. Later in the day, the man died. He was suffering from jaundice and had arrived from Mumbai in the state of illness.
Mangaluru, May 2: Dakshina Kannada district administration has taken steps to quarantine people returning after having lost their jobs in foreign countries.
Marriages hall, general halls and hostels are being identified for the purpose, a source said.
Official said that Coronavirus scare also has forced many people from foreign countries, those in including Gulf countries, to return to their native villages.
The Gulf countries are also sending back those staying illegally there.
Once the flight services resume, thousands of people are likely to return to the country.
Meanwhile, DK deputy commissioner Karnataka held a video conference with Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa.
Jan 2: A year after 12,000 acres of forests in Bandipur went up in smoke, the Karnataka Forest Department is gearing up for the summer even as the Forest Survey of India (FSI) has cautioned that 22.78 lakh acres (9,222 sq km) or about 20% of the green cover spread across three districts in the central part of the state is fire-prone.
The FSI studied forest fire incidents across the country between 2004-05 and 2017 before coming up with state-specific inputs.
According to the 13-year observation, Karnataka has 7,352 “fire points” or areas measuring 5 km X 5 km with frequent fire incidents.
Though the number is lower compared to states like Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha with over 20,000 points, the sheer spread of the fire-prone area itself is a challenge for the Karnataka Forest Department.
According to data, about three lakh acres (1,199.9 sq km) of forest area is very highly fire prone with 26 to 52 fire incidents in 13 years. This is followed by 7.6 lakh acres (3,067 sq km) of “highly fire prone” areas with an average of one to two incidents every year.
Almost all of the “red alert” areas are concentrated in Uttara Kannada, Chikkmagaluru, Shivamogga and Chamarajanagar districts. As temperature rises at the end of January, so does the risk of forest fires, requiring officials to be on vigil till the end of summer.
After an investigation into the Bandipur blaze revealed that faulty fire lines and poor supervision were the reason for the spread of the fire, the department has come up with a multi-pronged approach to prevent similar incidents this year.
“After the Bandipur incident, we have created a fire cell and a standard operating procedure (SOP) which everyone has to follow. Firstly, a fire management plan is prepared and approved by a competent authority.
The SOP has well defined firelines which have to be executed by December-end and burning must be completed by January 15,” Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Head of Forest Force) Punati Sridhar told DH.
He said that to ensure its strict implementation, GPS readings of firelines are to be submitted for random verification.
“All the required equipment from fire jackets to shoes, gloves, backpack sprayers and tractors mounted with 2,000-5,000 litre tanks with high pressure pumps will be deployed at vantage points,” he said.
In addition, the department’s fire cell works in collaboration with the Karnataka State Remote Sensing Applications Centre (KSRSAC) to give fire alerts within half and hour of an area catching fire and detected by satellites.
“Earlier, the gap used to be four hours by when the fire would have spread beyond control. Now, with reduced time gap, it would be easier to control fire early,” he added.
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