Indonesia: Haze Death Toll Climbing -- Minister

Ari Rikin Jakarta Globe 28 Oct 15;

Jakarta. The haze death toll continues to rise as efforts to extinguish the blazes blanketing Sumatra and Kalimantan are hampered by continuing dry conditions, a minister said on Wednesday.

Deaths from haze related respiratory illnesses have reached 19 across Central Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, Jambi, South Sumatra and Riau, Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa said. All five provinces have declared a state of emergency.

Residents will be continued to be evacuated while efforts to extinguish forest and peat fires carry on, Khofifah said.

"Every half an hour all district and neighborhood heads will get updates on the air quality index of their respective areas so that they can order an evacuation immediately," she said.

The haze crisis has continued to worsen as over 43 million people have been exposed to smoke from the wildfires, with over half a million cases of acute respiratory tract infections recorded.

The National Disaster Mitigation Agency has labeled the situation "a crime against humanity of extraordinary proportions."


Protected forest in Balikpapan burned down
N.Adri, thejakartapost.com 28 Oct 15;

Fires are destroying the Wain River Protected Forest in the northern part of Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, and were approaching Camp Djamaludin, a research station in the center of the primary forest, on Tuesday afternoon, locals have reported.

The HLSW Management Agency and local residents strove to extinguish the fires, which have been burning since Saturday, but fire spots continued to spring up, they said.

“We don’t know where the fires came from, and how many hectares of protected forest have been burned down,” said Nunuk Kasiyanto, a local resident living near Wain River, on Tuesday.

As of Tuesday afternoon, local authorities were still deploying personnel to help extinguish the fires.

Nunuk said around 150 military personnel from the 900 Raiders Battalion and a number of students from conservation groups in Samarinda had been deployed to help fight the fires. A long list of parties was reportedly working together to put out the fires, including HLSW management personnel, local residents and dozens of members of youth organizations, such as Pemuda Pancasila. They all had been involved in the fire extinguishing efforts since Saturday, Nanuk said.

Camp Djamaluddin, the research station in the middle of the 10-million-year-old primary forest, is mainly accessed via a 2-hour walk from an entrance gate near the Wain Dam. The Wain River Protected Forest is part of Karang Joang and Kariangau sub-districts in West Balikpapan district, Balikpapan, East Kalimantan. The protected forest is 9,782 hectares in size.

The western part of the forest borders on the Gulf of Balikpapan while in the east it ends at the Soekarno-Hatta highway, between the 20-kilometer point of the road and the 24 km point.

The Wain River Protected Forest is home to a number of protected animals and plants, such as East Kalimantan orangutans and sun bears, Proboscis monkeys, crocodiles, hundreds of bird species, dozens of Orchid species and tropical pitcher plants.

The protected forest, which was set up during the Dutch colonial era, is also the water catchment area for residents of Balikpapan. (ebf)(+)

Rains reduce the number of hotspots
Antara 28 Oct 15;

Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Rains in several parts of Sumatra and Kalimantan islands on Tuesday and Wednesday reduced the number of hotspots, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB).

"As rains fell, the number of hotspots fell, too," Chief of BNPB Data and Information Center and Public Relations Service, Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, said here on Wednesday.

He made it clear that land and forest fire fighting operations have begun showing significant results.

Cloud seeding operations conducted by sowing salt to create potential clouds have produced rains, he said.

"The rains that fell in many areas were a combination of man-made and natural rains," he said.

He said rains fell in some areas in Sumatra and Kalimantan on Tuesday and Wednesday.

"The community welcomed the rains joyfully, expressing gratitude to God, having been affected by smoke for more than two months," he said.

The rains have also resulted in the smoke thinning out and the visibility improving, he added.

Hotspots have been still detected in some areas in the two islands, he said.

"The number is not as high as before the rains fell," he said.

Based on the result of monitoring by Terra Aqua satellite, nine hotspots were detected in Sumatra and 282 hotspots in Kalimantan as of 04.00 p.m. on Wednesday.

Three of the hotspots in Sumatra were found in Lampung and six in South Sumatra, while 169 of the hotspots in Kalimantan were found in Central Kalimantan, 86 in East Kalimantan and 27 in South Kalimantan.(*)


Air quality in Sampit reportedly improving
Antara 28 Oct 15;

Sampit, C Kalimantan (ANTARA News) - Air quality in Sampit, Central Kalimantan, is reported to be improving after certain areas received rain recently, thinning out the smoke.

"Alhamdulillah (Thank God), the air is fresher although a thin layer of smoke remains, hopefully it will rain more which will completely put out the forest and land fire," said Salbi, a Sampit resident, here on Wednesday.

Weather in Sampit has been fairly clean recently although people still have to see the blue sky lasting from morning until noon. The wind is quite strong and the air, too, is cold. People expect that it will rain again.

According to the data obtained from the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Station at the Haji Asan Airport, Sampit on Wednesday morning said there are no hotspots in East Kotawaringin, Katingan and Seruyam district.

Also, the area that was covered by smoke is drastically receding.

Horizontal visibility throughout the morning, and until afternoon, was also recorded as being quite good, between 800 to 1,000 meters. This is much better than the severe conditions seen till now when the visibility was only about 10 to 300 meters.

However, everybody is reminded to remain at standby because potentially, smoke could again return. Peat fires have been noticed up to several meters deep in the ground, so the current rainfall may not extinguish the fire in the ground completely.

"Reports of zero hot spots could be because the satellite may be unable to penetrate into the thick peat layer. The rainfall that occurred in the last couple of days could have extinguished just the fire on the surface. Satellites can only take pictures at the surface level, and underground conditions may not be detected," Head of Haji Asan Sampit Airport weather station, Yulida Warni, said here on Wednesday.

Yulida asked all the people to pray for rain. Moreover, the current joint team is having difficulty in extinguishing the fire as most hotspots were located in very remote areas and were difficult to reach. Also, the fire extinguishing efforts were often hampered due to low visibility.

Although the smoke has already reduced significantly, local authorities have still kept the oxygen house and shelters on standby at several locations.

The local authority is still preparing in anticipation of the smoke plumes becoming denser again.(*)


Thin smoke from Sumatra reaches northern Banten waters
Antara 28 Oct 15;

Tangerang, Banten (ANTARA News) - The smoke arising from land and forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan has been spotted over the waters of north Banten.

Climatology Station officer from the Indonesian Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics (BMKG) Yanuar Henry Pribadi stated here on Wednesday that based on monitoring by the Himawari weather satellite, the smoke, which spread on October 27 at 11:30 p.m. local time, was still seen covering parts of the Sumatran region.

The thick smoke has not yet reached Java Island though only a thin layer of smog is now visible at an altitude of about 10 kilometers over the northern Banten waters.

"The smoke had reached North Banten waters but is still relatively thin. There is a high possibility of it reaching Tangerang area and is not likely to settle downwards," Yanuar affirmed.

Yanuar pointed out that the thin layer of smoke was due to the wind blowing in the opposite direction towards Singapore and Malaysia.

"The thick smoke is likely drifting towards Malaysia and Singapore, and there is only a thin layer of smog over Java Island," he reported.

Head of the Environment Agency of Tangerang City Dr Liza Puspadewi stated that thin smoke was visible in the southern city of Tangerang on Sunday morning.

However, the incident was only experienced briefly as the smoke was very thin and later disappeared.

Liza said her institution will soon notify the public to issue an early alert in anticipation of the spread of the smoke.

"Actually, it is not really that alarming as it is still very thin. So, it is still relatively safe," she noted.(*)


Haze victims struggle to remain optimistic
Hasyim Widhiarto and Syofiardi Bachyul Jb, The Jakarta Post 28 Oct 15;

Coughing continuously, Akhyar stood at the back of a crowd of people waiting at the registration desk of state-owned Dr. Doris Sylvanus General Hospital (RSUD) in Palangkaraya on Monday afternoon.

The young man, who makes ends meet as a seasonal worker in the neighboring Katingan regency, said he had traveled to the Central Kalimantan provincial capital in the hope of getting treatment for his persistent cough, allegedly triggered by thick haze that has blanketed the province since last month.

Akhyar, however, quickly changed his mind upon seeing the long line of patients with respiratory illnesses at the province’s largest hospital.

“There’s no hope for me to get immediate help here. I will book a flight to Lampung [on Sumatra] today to see my parents and get a medical checkup there,” Akhyar said, adding that he would return to Katingan only when the haze crisis had ended.

Indonesia has been struggling to curb the impacts of air pollution originating from fires in peatland and plantations in Sumatra and Kalimantan for months.

Palangkaraya, home to 250,000 people, has become the city with the worst air quality in the country, as the concentration of particulate matter (PM10) has stood at extremely dangerous levels for weeks.

The Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) reported on Tuesday that the PM10 concentration in the city stood at 1,696.06 micrograms per cubic meter (µg/m3), the highest nationwide.

Last week, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) reported that the ongoing haze crisis had claimed 10 lives and caused more than 500,000 people, mostly children, in the six worst-hit provinces to suffer from acute respiratory infections. Of the figure, 52,000 people were from Central Kalimantan.

In Palangkaraya, the huge number of incoming patients has made it difficult for local hospitals and community health centers (Puskesmas) to provide immediate medical assistance for some of the patients.

Last week, RSUD Dr. Doris Sylvanus, which has more than 250 beds, for example, temporarily stopped admitting patients as all of the hospital’s beds were occupied.

In an attempt to avoid hospital issues, local resident Chandra Wijaya said he and his wife had refrained from taking their 6-month-old baby outdoors in recent weeks to prevent the baby from getting sick.

“We leave the air conditioner on in our bedroom to make our baby comfortable,” Chandra told The Jakarta Post.

Central Kalimantan Health Agency head Suprastija Budi said the local authorities would prepare at least three buildings as evacuation shelters for haze victims.

Meanwhile, in Jambi, where fires have burned more than 15,000 hectares of land since August, local authorities are preparing to convert at least eight buildings into evacuation shelters, including Kotabaru Sports Hall and two convention centers.

In Riau, the country’s largest oil-producing region, a local BMKG station reported on Tuesday that haze had reduced visibility in several cities, including Pekanbaru, Dumai and Pelalawan, to below 800 meters.

In neighboring West Sumatra, eight of the province’s 19 regional administrations on Tuesday decided to close down kindergartens and elementary schools after air quality dropped to dangerous levels.

— Jon Afrizal in Jambi, Rizal Harahap in Pekanbaru and N. Adri in Balikpapan also contributed to this article.


Indonesians take fight against haze into their own hands
AFP AsiaOne 28 Oct 15;

PALANGKARAYA, Indonesia - Desperate civilians at the epicentre of Indonesia's haze crisis are taking the fight into the own hands, using whatever meagre resources they have to confront the fires ravaging their communities as they tire of waiting for the government to take action.

Wearing an oversized T-shirt and ill-fitting rubber boots, 13-year-old Yosua Oktavianus assisted his father douse a fire burning outside their hometown in Borneo as acrid smoke belched from the scorched earth.

"I just want to help my dad," he told AFP near Palangkaraya, a city of 240,000 where respiratory illnesses have soared as the smog has worsened in recent weeks.

Communities worst exposed to the toxic smog are becoming increasingly frustrated at authorities in Jakarta, insisting not enough is being done to aid their plight.

The government has launched water-bombing raids dumping water over blazes on Borneo and neighbouring Sumatra but has failed so far to bring thousands of fires under control.

It has also sent warships to Kalimantan -- Indonesia's half of Borneo island -- in case large-scale evacuations are needed, but many on the ground are choosing to fight not flee, using wooden sticks, pails of water and anything else on hand to douse the flames.

'Fed up of waiting'

After watching children and the elderly in his hometown fall sick under the pall of haze -- just some of the estimated half a million people who have suffered respiratory illnesses since the fires started in July -- 20-year-old Fery Auyadi decided enough was enough.

Banding together with his friends, the college students pooled their resources and collected donations for supplies before heading to the fire front.

"My friends and I were fed up of waiting for the government to act," he told AFP, dripping in sweat and mud as he battled a blaze outside Palangkaraya.

"It is now everybody's fight."

Another team in the area responded to reports of new fires and set off in pickup trucks, passing through a ruined, smoking landscape of charred earth and smouldering tree stumps.

The team scrambled to find water, a scarce resource on these tinder-dry peatlands, until a well was found at a nearby construction site.

As the team assembled the water pump, Sayban, who was wearing neither a firesuit or proper mask, stomped the smoking ground.

"At least my boots are heat resistant," the firefighter, who like many Indonesians goes by one name, told AFP.

Just as the ten-strong team arrived, reports of another blaze breaking out nearby came in. Working around the clock on a tight budget, and with limited equipment at hand, they know if the fires become too big they can do nothing but stand by and watch it burn.

In Palangkaraya, where many have fled since the smoke blanketing their town turned an eerie yellow, there are calls for those responsible for this environmental catastrophe to be punished, but local authorities are reluctant to point fingers.

Fires are deliberately lit every year by farmers seeking to quickly and cheaply clear their land to plant crops, particularly palm oil and pulp and paper plantations, but this year's blazes are on track to become the worst on record.

A prolonged dry season has seen widespread fires sweep Kalimantan and Sumatra, destroying 1.7 million hectares and killing ten people so far, some of whom died while fighting the blazes and others from the pollution.

Who is to blame?

Indonesia last month revoked the licence of a timber supplier and suspended the operations of three palm oil plantation operators over the fires, which have sent haze as far as Thailand and the Philippines, but catching people on the ground has proved far more difficult.

Angry residents in the heart of the haze crisis have blamed both major corporations and local farmers for the disaster, and want justice served.

"If you want to stop this disaster from happening again, you need to put the culprits in jail for a long time, revoke their license and confiscate their lands," local resident Andi told AFP.

The local government conservation agency in Palangkaraya declined to answer when asked by AFP who was behind the massive blazes, and why more perpetrators weren't being caught.

"It's not the time to point fingers, it's the time to act," agency head Nandang Prihadi said.

But conservation group Borneo Futures said it was unlikely internationally-listed companies were responsible for the fires.

Scientist Erik Meijaard said medium-scale plantation owners trying to expand their land may have asked farmers to burn the land on their behalf.

"So who is to blame? The guy who brings the jerrycan with fuel and a box of matches, the guy paying him to do that, or the company or politicians behind the people who pay?" he told AFP.

"Difficult to see and probably very context dependent."


Airport Operator, Airways Hit Hard By Forest Fire Haze
Fardah Antara 29 Oct 15;

Jakarta (Antara News) - The haze emanating from forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan harms not only the locals and the environment, but has also affected the financial performance of airways and state airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II.

PT Angkasa Pura II has suffered an estimated loss of Rp30 billion during the past month due to the haze, PT Angkasa Pura II President Director Budi Karya Sumadi said in Padangpariaman, West Sumatra on October 27.

Some three thousand flights were affected over the same period due to the haze, he stated.

The data on flight cancellations and delays were collected from September 1 to October 10, 2015.

"The worst hit airports are in Jambi and Pekanbaru followed by Pontianak. Other affected airports include Padang and Palembang as well as Kualanamu in Medan," he said.

The operations at Sultan Syarif Kasim (SSK) II International Airport of Pekanbaru, Riau Province, for instance, have frequently been shut down.

On October 19, the visibility dropped to 100 meters in the morning and improved to 400 meters by noon, forcing cancellations of more than 60 flights to and from Pekanbaru.

"From morning till noon today, no aircraft could fly. The airports operations are paralyzed again, after they nearly came to a standstill yesterday," Hasnan Siregar, the SSK II airports duty manager, noted on October 19.

Referring to the crowd of passengers at airports due to delayed and cancelled flights, Sumadi said he would remind the public that the delay and cancellation of flights is a fact and these things do happen in the country.

"We will operate to the maximum capacity the airports which are still active, such as Padang, Palembang, and Kualanamu, by equipping them with better facilities," the PT Angkasa Pura II chief said.

In the long run, the company will conduct research to find out the possibility of planes taking off and landing in areas shrouded by haze, he said.

PT Angkasa Pura II will improve the lighting system and control tower communication at various airports to enable aircraft to land and take off despite the haze reducing visibility to a certain distance.

The company will study whether a plane can take off and land even when the visibility is 1,000 meters, instead of 1,500 meters as required now, he said, citing an example.

In the meantime, Indonesias flag carrier Garuda was forced to cancel some two thousand flights up to September due to the haze, President Director of PT Garuda Indonesia M Arif Wibowo said recently.

Citilink, a subsidiary of Garuda Indonesia, cancelled 600 flights, affecting 120 thousand passengers.

The effect was significant because it caused revenue as well as opportunity losses, he said on the sidelines of a meeting of the Association of Indonesian National Air Carriers (Inaca).

PT Kalstar Aviation has also been significantly affected by the haze disaster because 90 percent of the airlines flight routes are in cities on the Kalimantan Island, the company�s Marketing Manager Mochammad Zainuddin said.

Some one thousand flights were cancelled, impacting nearly 120 thousand passengers, he said.

"The haze has been increasing with visibility dropping to 100 or 200 meters, forcing cancellation of flights," he remarked.

His company suffered losses worth billions of rupiahs because the flight frequency decreased from 70 flights a day to only 20 flights.

"Our flights have been affected by up to 60-70 percent. Our target was to serve 1.5 million passengers until the end of this year, but that has dropped to 1.3 million passengers," he noted.

In September, the Ministry of Transportation reported that some 21 airports in Sumatra and Kalimantan were affected by the haze, including those located in Palembang (South Sumatra), Pekanbaru (Riau), Jambi (Sumatra), Melak and Balikpapan (East Kalimantan), and Banjarmasin (South Kalimantan) in addition to Sampit, Palangkaraya, Pangkalan Bun, and Muara Teweh (Central Kalimantan). The other airports affected were Putusibau, Nangah Pinoh, Pontianak, Sintang, and Ketapang (West Kalimantan), apart from Long Apung (North Kalimantan), North Tapanuli (North Sumatra), and Pangkal Pinang (Bangka Belitung).

In fact, forest fires not only hit Sumatra and Kalimantan, but also parts of Sulawesi, Papua, and Java Islands.

Some airports in Papua and Sulawesi have also been affected by the haze, although it is not as bad as those on the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan.

On the island of Papua, for instance, the airports of Timika in Papua Province and Manokwari in West Papua Province, were recently shut down temporarily due to the smog from the forest fires.

Garuda Indonesia Airways cancelled flights at the two airports as the haze from the forest fires significantly reduced visibility in the areas, Manager of Garuda Indonesias Jayapura office Wahyudi told Antara, on Oct. 18.

The Papua meteorology office recorded 40 hotspots indicating forest fires particularly in the districts of Mappi and Merauke, on that date.

Since October 15, Garuda had cancelled flights in the Moses Kilangin Airport in Timika, he said.

Garuda was also forced to cancel flights in the Rendani Airport in Manokwari on October 18 and 19, according to him.

On Sulawesi Island, North Malukus Babullah Airport was shut down on October 22, due to a thick haze shrouding the airport area.

The haze blanketing the airport had reduced visibility to 800 meters, preventing planes from landing and taking off, the Head of the Babullah Airport, Rasburhany said. ***1***

(f001/INE/B003)
28-10-2015 21:07:29