Darko Tanasijevic: Wildfire a Kilometer From His Home
The TV host posted Instagram footage of a wildfire closing in on the Sumarak settlement in the Deliblato Sands, where his family owns a weekend house. About 500 hectares of forest are burning.
TV host Darko Tanasijevic posted footage on his Instagram profile today of a wildfire closing in on the Sumarak settlement in the Deliblato Sands, where his family owns a weekend house. By the information he says he received from the ground, about 500 hectares of forest are burning.
Sumarak is a small settlement at the heart of the sands. A new blaze broke out there on August 2, just as crews were already weeks into fighting earlier fires in the reserve. The footage Tanasijevic shared shows a yard and thick smoke covering the sky above the treetops.
In that post, he described how close the fire had come.
The Deliblato Sands are burning, the Sumarak settlement is burning! According to the information I’ve received, 500 hectares of forest are currently on fire, and the flames are dangerously close to the settlement where my house, our family’s weekend house, is located, along with the houses of our friends, neighbors, the people who live there. I hope this horror stops as soon as possible, everyone is very upset and worried, because this is an irreplaceable loss and an ecological catastrophe for the entire Deliblato Sands, which is a special nature reserve under the strictest, first category of protection.
In a second post, he was more specific about the distance.
People, what a disaster this is! This is only a kilometer or two from my house. This is irreplaceable damage to nature, to the entire Deliblato Sands. Helicopters and crews are on the ground. I hope this unprecedented fire is stopped as soon as possible. Unofficially, people are already being evacuated, following instructions from the authorities.
What Is Happening to Sumarak’s Residents
Residents are pulling back on the instructions of the emergency services. Firefighting and rescue units are working to contain the blaze, and people from the threatened areas are being moved to safety.
The Interior Ministry (MUP) is helping from the air. On site are:
- an H145 helicopter
- an H215 Super Puma
- a Kamov Ka-32, brought in as reinforcement
More than 80 firefighters are on the ground, along with workers from Vojvodinasume, the public enterprise that manages the reserve. Strong wind is hampering the firefighting effort. With this much resinous pine forest concentrated in one place, the fire line moves faster than crews can cut it off.
Why the Sands Are Not an Ordinary Forest
The Deliblato Sands is a special nature reserve under the first category of protection, the strictest that Serbian law recognizes. It is also known as the European Sahara. It is the largest sand area in Europe and home to more than 900 plant species, some of them rare and endemic.
That is why every hectare here counts differently than in a commercial forest. The pine stands now burning were planted to bind the sand, not to be logged.
How This Compares to Past Fires
The sands have a long history with fire. The worst blaze happened in 1996, when nearly 7,000 hectares burned. The 500 hectares Tanasijevic mentions is, by that measure, only about a fourteenth of that area, but it is ground that has already been under strain for weeks.
We reported on the first wave when a new fire flared up a kilometer from the July blaze. That same closeness is now repeating in a different form, only this time it is measured from people’s homes.
Tanasijevic is one of the more recognizable faces on Pink television. The weekend house in Sumarak is a family home, not a place he uses for work, and in his posts he repeatedly mentioned neighbors and their houses, not only his own.
His posts remain on his profile, with the footage of smoke over the settlement. At the time of writing, the fire has not been contained.
