Summer and ripe crops have brought a new threat to agrarians. Stubble and ripe crops easily burst into flames from artillery fire.
Pavlo Sergienko, a farmer from Zaporizhzhia region, met the morning of July 11 running through a wheat field with green tree branches hurriedly torn off. He desperately tried to put out the fire, which could have destroyed the harvest of 90 hectares, writes “ProAgro Group” with reference to Forbes.ua.
“The fire from stubble turned to wheat. I extinguished it with improvised means, while waiting for the tractor driver to come and fence off the fire,” recalls Sergienko.
The fire was extinguished, but burned about 20 hectares. The farmer owns about 3000 hectares of land.
Since mid-June, burning fields have been a frequent sight for local farmers. “If it doesn’t burn at your place, it burns at a neighbor’s,” says Sergienko. His brother has 15 hectares burned, and the farmer next door has 40 hectares.
The Russians shell the fields, the exploding shells set fire to dry stubble or ripe wheat – and the fire starts.
“If wheat catches fire, the wall of fire is about 2 meters. You can’t get close to it. You just wait until everything burns down and the flames subside,” says the farmer.
