Negligent hikers likely behind brush fire which ravaged forest

A forest fire which destroyed 25 acres of natural forest in the north of Israel on Monday and which took multiple firefighting units several hours to suppress, was likely started by negligent hikers.

Channel 2 reported that an hour after the blaze in the Biriya Forest in the Upper Galilee region was finally under control Monday evening, investigators identified the central starting point of the fire as a campfire lit next to a field of thorns.

The suspicion, according to authorities, is that the bonfire set the field on fire and the panicked hikers who lit the blaze made an hasty escape. A formal investigation has been opened.

There were no injuries in the fire close to a site which is traditionally believed to be the location of the grave of Yonatan ben Uziel, a Jewish scholar who lived around the turn of the first century CE.

Israeli fire fighters work to extinguish a forest fire in Biriya Forest, near Safed in northern Israel, April 25, 2016. (Basel Awidat/Flash90)

Eight firetrucks from the Galilee-Golan fire station were involved along with eight firefighting aircraft and another seven firetrucks from the Israel National Fund that maintains the forest.

A major concern for firefighters was preventing the flames from spreading to the nearby community of Amuka.

Hikers in the area were initially evacuated from the site, and local roads were closed as a precaution.

Firefighters were also called in to deal with a blaze in the area of Gedera, in the center of the country, Channel 2 reported.

Earlier Monday, a fire broke out along Route 3, near Moshav Yesodot in central Israel. Train services in the area were halted and hikers were also evacuated from the area. Firefighters assisted by an aircraft brought the flames under control after an hour.

In February, Israel Fire and Rescue Services Commissioner Shahar Ayalon told the Knesset Interior Committee that “we are today the safest country in the world in terms of casualties from fire.”

Ayalon described the improvement to massive investment in the nation’s firefighting service following the 2010 Carmel forest fire, in which 44 people died, most of them Prisons Service guards on their way to evacuate a nearby prison as the fire spread.