For the staff of the Fondes Amandes Community Reforestation Projection the rainy season cannot come soon enough.
Hours after we meet at their St Ann’s headquarters the rain clouds gather over Port-of-Spain and, like a miracle, rain begins to fall. It soon stops, however, and it’s another few days before more persistent rain comes.
“We’ve had no April showers,” Akilah Jaramogi, the project’s founder director, says. “They used to say poui flower, rain fall. Not this year.
“This is the reality of global warming. The old patterns have gone. If people don’t believe it, look at this. Strange weather conditions abound.”
Forest fires have been at their most extensive and severe for many years in this particularly long dry season, “the worst since 1997,” according to Jaramogi.
Records on the T&T Fire Services Web site show a recent decline in bush fires. In 2013 just 101 bush fires were recorded compared to 1,566 reported in 2009. A spokesman at the Chaguanas Fire Prevention Administration department (which keeps the official tally) said drought conditions in 2009-10 and 2002-4 were comparable to those in 1997-8. Records for this year aren’t officially available until the dry season is over.
Asked if fires like those in St Ann’s, Diego Martin, Cascade and Fort George could cause a wide-scale disaster leading to loss of life and destruction of property, Jaramogi says, “It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when.”
The damage to the delicate ecosystem, the enhanced threat of flooding and the damage to wildlife are all serious issues. The blackened and charred ridges where once were trees will take a long time to regrow.
“We need little trickles of rain first, to get some green shrubs growing back,” Jaramogi says.
Her fear now is that heavy rain could cause landslides.
“If rain comes hard there’s nothing to hold it back, just soil and bare ground, no roots. Silt, branches and leaves will wash down into a drain. We could have massive flooding this year.”
No criminal charges
Forest fires happen for different reasons, Jaramogi says. Many are deliberately lit.
“Some people light a fire to burn garbage and dry stuff and they walk away or it gets out of hand. Some do slash-and-burn farming or just gardening. Some are mischievous or malicious fires.”
Why would somebody deliberately start a fire in a forest?
“It’s a trend for some,” she says. “They like the look of a fire burning in the night.
“Nobody is ever charged. They’re treating it like a joke. We have the Fire Act, so implement it. Make an example of these people. Even if it’s community service.”
She is clearly frustrated.
“I can’t arrest people,” she continues. “I have no authority. I’m a woman. I’m not going to confront a bully. I’ve done conflict resolution training, but I won’t put myself at risk. If you talk too soft they ignore you; if you talk too hard they become aggressive.
“The Forestry Division has wardens who are able to charge people. I requested them to come and investigate these fires like they were a case of arson. I wanted backup, it was a serious matter, I wanted to see trucks, house-to-house inquiries, reports taken. Nobody called me back.”
“Where is the minister making a state of the environment report? Where are the Minister of National Security and the Minister of the Environment and Water Resources? They’ve said nothing.”
As the T&T Guardian leaves the project compound, Jaramogi tells us to do a rain dance and pray for the rainy season to arrive.
Volunteers in tears
The small group of volunteers she employs often feel as if they are the only ones fighting fire in this area of northwest Trinidad. Jaramogi is able to pay them a stipend thanks to a government grant from the National Reforestation and Watershed Rehabilitation Programme.
“If it wasn’t for us the whole ridge would have burned,” a volunteer says.
There is only one helicopter assigned to deal with fires in the dry season. Jaramogi says it’s not enough. In April, when fires swept through the St Ann’s ridge for several days, the helicopter was seldom seen bringing out the bambi bucket full of water.
When it did fly over, says Curwyn Collett (a supervisor at FACRP) it came too low and its rotor blades spread the fire further, making the situation worse.
“It blew it over the top of the ridge,” he told the T&T Guardian when we visited their base at the foot of the mountain.
“They tip the bucket while they’re moving and the sprinkles of water just evaporate in the air from the heat, it doesn’t out the fire. The buckets only hold about two gallons of water, that’s not enough.”
The volunteers had just finished a meeting. Some were in tears at the lack of support they feel they have had from the Ministry of National Security, the Forestry Division, Fire Service and the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Management in terms of help, funding and resources and in terms of enforcing the laws and prosecuting those who started the fires, many of which they believe were started maliciously.
Instead it falls to the volunteers to attempt to put out fires in dangerous situations, without even the luxury of fireproof clothing or boots.
“This kind of outfit will fry up,” says Collett pointing to his clothes.
Also, smoke is highly toxic if inhaled. Fire patrol workers have fainted before. One had his face burnt and there are countless minor injuries. Another worker, in her 40s, has had a stroke.
Daunting task
Asked how a group of underresourced volunteers can tackle the blazes, seen from as far away as Ariapita Avenue in Woodbrook, Jaramogi tries to paint the picture.
“Picture me 3,000 feet above sea level. That’s how high the mountaintop is, with my backpack, drinking water, first aid, a phone, a beater to fight the fire, a cutlass to chop branches and cut off the fuel and a staff or stick.”
Collett shows me the backpack of water with a hose attachment they go up and down with, spraying the fire. It’s heavy even without any water inside it. They get as close to the edge of the blaze as possible and use the beaters to snuff out as much as they can to stop it spreading. They use tools to cut vegetation away and clear leaf litter, leaving bare earth to create natural fire breaks. Sometimes they even use dirt to stamp out fires.
Jaramogi described the mayhem of April’s fires when her team was leaping fences four feet high, negotiating guard dogs, asking residents to turn off their electric gates so they could get to the flames.
It’s difficult at times to get a grip on the hillsides to balance yourself. Vines hang down, tempting you to reach out and grab them, but some of them will leave thorns in your hand that won’t come out for days until you start to see pus emerge from the wounds.
Amongst the carnage left behind, they find dead snakes, iguanas and agouti with burnt feet. Birds migrate, jettisoning their usual migratory patterns. Animals still alive tend to be angry. Mapepire snakes, for example, are poisonous and dangerous when aggressive.
Prevention
Guardian columnist and environmentalist Marc de Verteuil described the fires as “a disaster for wildlife.”
“The hunting moratorium has given wildlife a chance to recover, but the habitat destruction we are seeing must be causing loss to wildlife. It may be worth considering extending the hunting moratorium to make up for the losses,” he said.
“More reforestation projects are necessary so we can respond better to these forest fires. The best response would be through prevention.
“This is important because the prediction is climate change will result in longer drought periods combined with heavier precipitation when it does rain. It is much cheaper to implement reforestation than to incur year after year of property damage costs.
“Let’s also see some arrests made for fire-starters.
“All these fires were started by irresponsible people whose actions have huge impacts on the ecosystem and on property. By not prosecuting these irresponsible people, we are condoning their actions and encouraging more of the same.
“Often we see a fire start small in the morning and by evening time its a huge, out-of-control inferno. Quick response is key to minimising damage. It would be useful to equip National Security helicopters to drop fire-fighting crews at hard-to-reach areas of the bush which can otherwise only be accessed after exhausting treks through the jungles and up steep hillsides which can often take hours.
“These fires are preventable and NGOs need 100 per cent backing in terms of capability and equipment.”