Flames engulf +250 palms in southern Iraq
2022-08-27T18:00:08+00:00
Shafaq News/ Blazes engulfed more than 250 palm trees in the southern governorate of al-Muthanna, Iraq's Civil Defense Directorate said on Saturday.
A statement by the directorate said that the firefighting teams managed to control and extinguish a huge fire that erupted inside an agricultural area in al-Muzlem, al-Rumaytha district.
The flames turned 250 palm trees to aches but left no casualties, according to the statement.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Iraq was the world's top producer of dates, with nearly 32 million date palm trees growing across the country.
But since war broke out with neighboring Iran in the 1980s, Iraq has lost at least half of those trees, with the government estimating in 2004 that only nine million remained.
