The professors of the Department of Forestry of NUBiP of Ukraine, in cooperation with the State Agency of Forest Resources of Ukraine, held the first the history of Ukraine theoretical and practical training course for a forest firefighter

 During September 28-30, employees of the Department of Forestry of the Education and Research Institute of Forestry and Landscape-Park Management of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine, employees of the Regional East European Center for Fire Monitoring, together with a team of practitioners from SE Chernihiv Forestry (before the reorganization - SE “Oster Military Forestry”) conducted a theoretical and practical training of a basic level forest firefighter.

According to the new Procedure for the Organization of Protection and Protection of Forests dated May 20, 2022, persons who are involved in extinguishing forest fires and require special knowledge and skills in matters of prevention, detection and extinguishing of fires, fire safety, undergo special training "Forest Firefighter Training Course". In addition, persons who can be involved as extinguishing managers, before starting their duties, as well as once every three years, must undergo training or advanced training in forest fire prevention and extinguishing according to the standard program "Forest fire extinguishing manager".
The training began with welcoming and introductory words from the Director of Education and Research Institute of Forestry and Landscape-Park Management Petro Lakyda, Director of Ukrcentrkadrilis Sergiy Irklienko, Director of the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC) Johann Georg Goldammer, representative of the State Forest Service Vitaly Bilous, head of the Regional Eastern Europe Center for Fire Monitoring Sergiy Zibtsev.

Large forest and landscape fires of a new type in 2020 in Zhytomyr, Kyiv and Luhansk regions for the first time in Ukraine led to human casualties, destruction of entire settlements, damage and death of forests on an area of more than 157,000 hectares. Expenses for extinguishing fires reached hundreds of millions of hryvnias, and losses to society, the economy, and the environment reached tens of billions of hryvnias.
One of the main causes of such fires was the combination of a long period of extreme fire hazard weather (class 5) with wind speed above 35-45 km/h-1. The constant presence of a significant number of fire sources in the landscapes of Ukraine (on the lands of rural and urban areas of destination, floodplains, pastures, fallows, near settlements and summer cottage cooperatives, in forests, along railways, highways, power supply networks, etc.) and dangerous weather conditions led to the simultaneous occurrence of a significant number of rapid landscape fires, which after entering the pine forests acquired a high burning intensity. This created extreme difficulties for their extinguishing by the means and forces of forest protection, forest fire stations of forestry enterprises, institutions of the nature reserve fund and involved fire departments of other departments.
The training was conducted by: Sergiy Zibtsev, professor of the Department of Forestry of the NUBiP of Ukraine, director of the Regional East European Fire Monitoring Center; Vasyl Gumenyuk, Oleksandr Soshenskyi, associate professors of the Department of Forestry of the NUBiP of Ukraine, employees of the Regional East European Fire Monitoring Center; Volodymyr Braiko, head of the department of forest protection and protection of SE Chernihiv forestry.
27 representatives of permanent forest users of the Chernihiv Regional Department of Forestry and Hunting took part in the training, particularly SE “Horodnyanske Forestry”, SE “Koryukiv Forestry”, SE “Nizhyn Forestry”, SE “Novhorod-Siverskyi Forestry” and SE “Chernihiv forestry”.

The practical part of the training was provided by the instructors of SE ”Chernihiv Forestry” (before forestries reorganization - a team from SE “Ostersky Military Forestry”): Volodymyr Braiko, Mykola Troyan, Denys Makhov, Valery Dvornik, Valentin Muzyka, Roman Karamelya, Oleksiy Savlyuk. During the field exercises, the issues of using manual tools for laying mineralized strips and extinguishing fires were worked out. The use of water supply systems - laying hose lines, using motorized pumps, giving special hand signals; organization and use of communication, rules for using radio stations and walkie-talkies; use of fire modules, knapsack fire extinguishers, fire trucks; application of controlled burning to reduce stocks of combustible materials and localize the fire.

Each day of training included two parts - theoretical and practical. The theoretical part took place in the auditorium at the base of Ukrcentrkadrylis, and the practical part took place in the field on the territory "Boyaka Forest Research Station".

Climate changes, which became one of the causes of new types of fires, indicate a high probability of a recurrence of extremely dangerous weather conditions similar to those of April 4-16 (Narodychi village, Ovruch city), July 7 and September 30, 2020 (Severodonetsk city). A new level of fire hazard weather and a new type of fire require new methods of combating them. In the absence of state funding of forestry and martial law, the real possibilities for updating fire equipment and fire extinguishing means by forestry enterprises are significantly limited. Therefore, the most promising areas of fighting against new types of fires are those that will not require significant financial costs. 1) Improvement of fire prevention system; 2) increasing the level of preparedness, the efficiency of fire detection and the first attack on a fire; 3) upgrading the qualifications of forest fire extinguishing managers, forest guards and forest firefighters regarding the use of modern fire prevention and extinguishing methods; 4) improvement of firefighting organization. Contamination of forests with explosive objects creates new non-standard risks for firefighters.
The purpose of the training: theoretical and practical training of basic level forest fire fighters of state forestry enterprises, acquisition of practical skills regarding the peculiarities of the organization and extinguishing of forest fires.
The results of the training were summed up by passing an exam on theory and assessment of practical skills, based on which the participants will get special certificates that they have successfully completed the basic training course according to the typical program "Course of forest firefighter training".

The program of the training -  sites/default/files/u184/programa_kurs_pidgotovki_lisovogo_pozhezhnika_24-09-22_finalna.pdf

Sergiy Zibtsev, Oleksandr Soshenskyi, Vasyl Humeniuk,
employees of the Department of Forestry of the
Education and Research Institute of Forestry and Landscape-Park Management