Southeast Asia haze on track to be worst on record after ‘horrendous’ fires in Indonesia

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A Nasa satellite image shows smoke from fires in Indonesia over the coasts of Borneo and Sumatra. Photo: Reuters

Published: 3:19pm, 2 Oct 2015

Forest fires blanketing Southeast Asia in choking haze are on track to become among the worst on record, scientists warn, with a prolonged dry season hampering efforts to curb the crisis.

Malaysia, Singapore and large expanses of Indonesia have suffered for weeks from acrid smoke billowing from fires on plantations and peatlands that are being illegally cleared by burning.

The crisis grips the region nearly every year during the dry season, flaring diplomatic tensions among the neighbours as flights are grounded, schools close and pollution levels reach hazardous highs.

But the current outbreak is one of the worst and longest-lasting in years, with an El Nino weather system making conditions drier than usual in Indonesia and keeping much-needed rain at bay.

Indonesian soldiers carry a gas powered water pump used to help extinguish a peatland fire in Ogan Ilir, South Sumatra province. Photo: Reuters

Scientists at Nasa now warn this year’s outbreak is on a trajectory similar to 1997 – widely regarded as the most serious haze event on record – and could exceed those unprecedented levels.

“Conditions in Singapore and southeastern Sumatra are tracking close to 1997,” Robert Field, a Columbia University scientist based at Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, was quoted as saying by the US science agency.