Indonesia: Immediate evacuation ordered

Hans Nicholas Jong and Nani Afrida, The Jakarta Post 24 Oct 15;

The government is gearing up for a massive evacuation of haze victims in Sumatra and Kalimantan following an order from President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, who said to prioritize the evacuation of babies, children and people vulnerable to worsening air quality.

During a Cabinet meeting on Friday, Jokowi ordered ministers to immediately evacuate haze victims.

“Add more evacuation areas equipped with air purifiers, especially for children and babies,” Jokowi said on Friday.

Following the instruction, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Panjaitan convened another meeting on Friday to discuss details about the evacuation operation, which is expected to start on Saturday.

“Tomorrow, the team will assess which locations are suitable to set up shelters. We will also prepare air purifiers for schools, hospitals and other public spaces so that people can breathe fresh air inside a closed room.” Coordinating Human Development and Culture Minister Puan Maharani said after the meeting.

Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa said the government was focusing the evacuation process on seven provinces affected by the haze; Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, South Kalimantan and East Kalimantan.

“There are some regions that we have decided to turn into evacuation areas based on our assessment,” Khofifah said on Friday.

Besides shelters, the government also planned to use government-owned buildings for evacuation purposes, National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) Willem Rampangilei said.

“We are working with regional governments to take inventory of buildings or rooms that we can use,” he said.

Also joining the evacuation operation will be the Indonesian Navy, which will deploy two Landing Platform Dock (LPD) type warships that could be used to house haze victims from Sumatra and Kalimantan.

“We will provide the ships as temporary shelters, particularly for children and toddlers, until [the situation] improves,” Indonesian Navy spokesperson Commodore M. Zainuddin said in Jakarta on Friday.

The two warships are KRI Banda Aceh and KRI Dr. Suharso, which also serve as hospital military ships.

KRI Banda Aceh will drop its anchor in Palembang, South Sumatra, while KRI dr Suharso will be deployed in Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan.

Zainuddin said that the naval evacuation would start if the air pollution standard index (ISPU) reached a hazardous level and there were no other alternative solutions.

“We will focus more on evacuating children. We will discuss details of the operation with the health and social affairs ministries,” he said.

Other than the evacuation order, Jokowi also instructed Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar to implement a total moratorium on peatland exploitation in Indonesia, as the government believed that the mismanagement of peatland was behind the annual forest fires.

“Immediately restore peatland, review old permits. We have to be strict now. Those [peatland areas] that have not been opened yet cannot be opened,” Jokowi said.

Siti said that her ministry would carry out the instruction immediately given the severity of the problem.

“Of course we will. It’s true. No more permits can be issued and no more peatland areas can be opened,” she said.

The government will also seek more foreign assistance to tackle the haze by inviting France and Canada to discussions on how to extinguish fires on peat land.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Arrmanatha Nasir said that Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi had spoken with the Canadian and French ambassadors to Indonesia on the possibility of sending experts to Indonesia to aid in mitigation efforts.

“During a recent coordination meeting at the Office of the Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister, we discussed seeking out expertise to help us extinguish fires that continue to burn underneath peatland,” Arrmanatha said after an Indonesia-Australia bilateral meeting in Padang, West Sumatra.

Meanwhile, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said that Australia remained committed to assisting mitigation efforts, despite having recalled the Hercules aircraft it dispatched earlier.

“[The Hercules airplane] was here for a week and did about 22 runs dumping about 300,000 liters of water over the affected area, and we also had a plane that carried out a number of reconnaissance flights over the affected area,” Bishop said.

— Tama Salim contributed to this report from Padang


Haze victims get emergency care
Hasyim Widhiarto, Apriadi Gunawan and Nethy Dharma Somba, The Jakarta Post 25 Oct 15;

In response to the prolonged haze crisis in Sumatra and Kalimantan, the government has pledged to intensify health assistance for haze victims in the country’s worst affected areas while preparing for their evacuation, anticipating worsening air pollution.

Learning from his administration’s unsuccessful attempts to put out extensive forest and peat land fires that have produced haze over the past weeks, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo on Friday instructed his ministers to prepare for the evacuation of haze victims, particularly infants and children, in a number of the worst hit provinces, including Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra and Central Kalimantan.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a visit to Banjarmasin in South Kalimantan and Pulang Pisau in Central Kalimantan on Saturday, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, however, explained that the evacuation would be implemented in stages, with the relocation of haze victims from home to local health facilities or evacuation shelters as the first and foremost part of the plan.

“We will ask medical schools to assign their newly graduated physicians to community health centers [Puskesmas] or local hospitals to help run emergency services. […] We will also ask the Indonesian Military [TNI] to deploy their village supervisory non-commissioned officers [Babinsa] to help local residents take their sick babies to Puskesmas for immediate medical assistance,” Luhut said.

The government, according to Luhut, will relocate haze victims to another city should the existing shelters and medical facilities no longer be capable of handling the impact of the haze.

“If things get worse, we will move the victims to a safer city. If the situation gets worse, then we will put them in warships or ships,” he said.

Over the past few months, Indonesia has been struggling to deal with the impacts of haze originating from fires in peat land and plantations in Sumatra and Kalimantan.

The ongoing haze crisis has also been exacerbated by this year’s prolonged dry season that has been triggered by the El Niño weather phenomenon.

Last week the Health Ministry revealed that the haze had caused 425,377 people in six provinces to suffer from acute respiratory infections (ISPA). In Pekanbaru, Riau, at least three people died due to respiratory failure allegedly triggered by the haze that has been blanketing the province for almost two months.

In anticipation of the massive evacuation of haze victims, the government has so far named Banjarmasin as the evacuation city for residents in Central Kalimantan, whose capital of Palangkaraya became the city with the worst air quality in the country last month.

Luhut — who was accompanied by Culture and Education Minister Anies Baswedan, Health Minister Nila F. Moeloek, Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa and Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar during his visit on Saturday to the two neighboring regions — said the government was also ready for the worst.

“There will be warships, passenger ships and hospital ships standing by [in Banjarmasin]. This is to show that we understand the problem and are serious about dealing with it,” he said.

Minister Khofifah said that her ministry would soon distribute 7,000 air purifiers to residents in Central Kalimantan in an attempt to curb the impact of the haze.

“They can be installed at residents’ houses. Hopefully, we won’t need to evacuate the residents after all,” she said.

Acting South Kalimantan Governor Tarmizi Abdul Karim said that his administration had prepared several government buildings in anticipation of incoming evacuees.

“Our biggest evacuation shelter so far is the local haj dormitory, which can accommodate around 700 people,” he said.

In North Sumatra, thickening haze forced the management of Kualanamu International Airport in Deli Serdang regency to temporarily halt the operation of the airport on Saturday morning for safety reasons.

The worsening air quality in the provincial capital of Medan also forced the local administration to close down schools, starting from Saturday until sometime next week.

In Papua, Merauke Regional Military Commander, Brig. Gen. Supartodi said the TNI had deployed 100 military personnel from Timika to Merauke to help extinguish hot spots in the regency, which have triggered haze in surrounding areas over the past several days.


Meteorology Agency Labels Indonesia's Haze Crisis a Crime Against Humanity
Dina Manafe Jakarta Globe 24 Oct 15;

Jakarta. Indonesia's haze crisis continues to worsen, with over 43 million people already breathing in the toxic fumes from forest and peat fires, leading the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) to speak of a "crime against humanity of extraordinary proportions."

The BMKG said on Saturday that satellite images show parts of the Greater Jakarta region are now also affected.

At least ten people have died from exposure to the haze so far in Sumatra and Kalimantan, the hardest-hit parts of the country.

Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for the BMKG, said several people died during efforts to extinguish the flames while others fell gravely ill and died after breathing in the toxic fumes, mostly because they had an existing health condition.

The death toll cited by Sutopo did not include seven hikers who were killed in a forest fire on Mount Lawu in East Java on Oct. 18. Two others from the same group remain in critical condition.

More than 500,000 cases of acute respiratory tract infections due to the haze have been reported in Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, and West, Central and South Kalimantan in the period from July 1 until Friday, the BMKG spokesman said.

Sutopo stressed that these were only the recorded cases, so the extent of suffering in these six provinces, where a state of emergency has been declared, is likely much higher.

The spokesman said that "99 percent" of the fires were lit intentionally, meaning that the haze crisis should be considered a man-made disaster.

"This is a crime against humanity of extraordinary proportions," Sutopo said. "But now is not the time to point fingers but to focus on how we can deal with this quickly."

Conservation scientist and Jakarta Globe columnist Erik Meijaard previously described the ongoing disaster as "the biggest environmental crime of the 21st century."


Protests against land, forest fires increase as haze worsens
Apriadi Gunawan and Rizal Harahap, The Jakarta Post 24 Oct 15;

Protests against forest and land fires are increasingly widespread in haze-affected regions as pollution from the fires worsens across Sumatra and Kalimantan.

In Medan, North Sumatra, air pollution in the city is four times more severe than normal.

The thick smog has also continued to disrupt flights at Kualanamu International Airport and other airports in North Sumatra and Aceh as visibility is limited to 1,000 meters.

Kristin Matondang of the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency’s (BMKG) Medan branch said the haze blanketing Medan and surrounding regions came from Riau, Jambi and South Sumatra as no hot spots had been detected in North Sumatra.

“At 1 p.m. the concentration of particulate matter [PM10] in Medan was 549.12 µg/m³, much higher than the normal concentration of 150 µg/m³,” Kristin said on Friday.

The conditions moved some community groups to stage protests across Medan.

The Alliance of North Sumatra People Against Haze, for example, staged a rally at Bundaran Majestik by conducting a theatrical performance entitled Burned Forest People.

A similar rally was staged by dozens of activists from Satria Hijau (Green Knights) at Merdeka Square, demanding the government get rid of the haze.

“We have been suffering for months because of the thickening haze,” said Fitri, a protester.

Protests were also widespread in neighboring Riau province as thousands of university students, teachers and lecturers staged a rally at the governor’s office demanding an end to the haze problems.

They urged the government to arrest owners of big companies operating in Riau alleged to be involved in forest and land fires in the region.

“They are big investors that have destroyed forests in Riau. They have caused the haze in Riau,” Hendri Marhadi, a protester, said at the rally.

Meanwhile, some 3,000 teachers in Pekanbaru grouped under the Teachers’ Forum Against Haze urged the government to declare the haze a national disaster as it had claimed lives.

Pekanbaru Education Agency head Zulfadil, who was among the protesters, urged the President to use all available resources to deal with the smoke.

“The paralysis in the education sector is really deplorable. Something must be done to send students back to school and learning with clean air,” Zulfadil said.

Separately in Jambi, residents of Pandan Makmur and Pandan Sejahtera subdistricts in Geragai district, East Tanjungjabung regency, have been trying for two months to extinguish fires in their peatland.

Due to limited facilities and the quick movement of the fires, however, they have not yet extinguished the blaze that has so far burned 100 hectares of peat.

“We only use simple tools to extinguish the fires,” chairman of local farmers’ association, Edi Suwardi, told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

In Palangkaraya, Central Kalimantan, Antara news agency reported that the pollution had forced six toddlers suffering from respiratory problems to be evacuated along with their parents to Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan.

“I am so relieved arriving in Banjarmasin after a few weeks of thick haze in Palangkaraya,” Linda, the mother of one of the toddlers, said in Banjarmasin on Thursday.

Separately, a fire on Mount Lawu that caused a blaze in Cemoro Sewu forest in Magetan, East Java, as of Friday had spread to as far as Cemoro Kandang forest in Karanganyar, Central Java.


— Ganug Nugroho Adi in Surakarta and Jon Afrizal in Jambi also contributed to this story


Haze remains, govt prepares evacuation in Central Kalimantan
thejakartapost.com 24 Oct 15;

The government has prepared seven locations in Central Kalimantan to be evacuated due to smog, according to Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa on Saturday.

“President Joko [Jokowi] Widodo has instructed us to evacuate to locations inside the province,” said Khofifah as quoted by Antara news agency.

According to Khofifah, the locations, including the ministry’s auditorium and halls at Panti Budi Luhur institution, were all air-conditioned and able to accommodate hundreds of people. The ministry also prepared public field kitchens, water tank vehicles and rescue vehicles.

One thousand air purifiers were also set to arrive to be installed in residents’ homes to decrease the number of evacuated victims.

Thick haze was still blanketing several parts of Indonesia on Saturday.

Morning visibility in Kualanamu International Airport in North Sumatra reached between 350 meters and 800 meters, causing planes to be delayed or even canceled.

Low visibility between 100 meters to 300 m still exists in Riau regency, including in Pelalawan, Dumai, Pekanbaru, Rengat, Bengkalis, Siak, Meranti and Indragiri Hili.

According to the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG), 197 hot spots were detected throughout Sumatra on Saturday morning, with South Sumatra being the major contributor with 180 hot spots.

Beringin Airport in Muara Teweh, Central Kalimantan, was currently closed due to the area’s 150 m visibility. It has not been operational since Sept. 4., affecting flights from Susi Air’s scheduled planes and chartered aircraft from Airfast, Air Born and Hevilift. (kes)(+)


Haze kills 10 people, leaves 503,874 with respiratory ailments
thejakartapost.com 24 Oct 15;

Ten people have died in Sumatra and Kalimantan due to smog from forest and land fires, which include those killed during fire extinguishing operations and victims of acute respiratory infections (ISPA), according to the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) on Saturday.

In addition to these victims, seven climbers were also killed and two others were in a critical condition after being trapped in a forest fires on the slopes of Mount Lawu on the border of East Java and Central Java on Oct. 18.

BNPB also stated that the number of ISPA patients had reached 503,874 in six provinces between July 1 and October 23, with the top six contributors including Jambi with 129,229 patients, South Sumatra with 101,333, South Kalimantan with 97,430, Riau with 80,263 , Central Kalimantan with 52,142 and West Kalimantan with 43,477.

Based on the agency’s analysis, more than 43 million Indonesians have been exposed to smog in Sumatra and Kalimantan alone. Neighboring countries such as Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines have also experienced a decline in air quality following the haze dilemma.

“The smog disaster due to forest and land fires is a man-made disaster, since 99 percent of the fires are intentional. It is an extraordinary crime against humanity," said BNPB spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho in a press release on Saturday.

"[But] this isn’t the time for us to play the blame game; it’s a time to act fast since the scale of the fires is so wide that it will be impossible to extinguish them in the next one or two weeks," added Sutopo. (kes)(+)


BNPB says Haze Heading to Jakarta
Tempo 24 Oct 15;

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) reported that haze that hit Sumatera and Kalimantan was getting widespread, had even reached Java.

“From the monitoring of Himawari satellite, thin haze was covering Java Sea and some were heading to Jakarta,” said Head of BNPB Information Center Sutopo Purwo Nugroho on Saturday (24/10).

Sutopo also said that haze had even reached other countries in South East Asia, such as the Philippines and air quality in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore has declined.

Furthermore, BNPB reported that at least 503,874 people were affected by respiratory infections (ISPA) and the data was collected from six provinces in Sumatera and Kalimantan.

AVIT HIDAYAT


Haze spreads to Java and halts flights from Bandung
thejakartapost.com 24 Oct 15;

The National Disaster Management Body (BNPB) has explained that the haze disaster that has seriously affected many parts of Sumatra and Kalimantan, disrupting transportation and causing health problems, has started to spread to Java.

“Based on the results of monitoring by Himawari Satellite, the thin haze has started to cover the air above the Java Sea and is heading to Jakarta,” said head of BNPB’s information data center Sutopo Purwo Nugroho on Saturday as reported by tempo.co.

In Bandung, airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II had to delay flights from Husein Sastranegara airport due to declining visibility to 3,000 meters from the safe condition of 3,900 m.

PT Angkasa Pura II spokesman Mabruri said that the airport authority had to delay five flights from Husein Sastranegara airport until 11 a.m., while six planes that were scheduled to land in the airport were redirected to Soekarmo-Hatta Airport in Tengerang, Banten.

“There was another plane that had to fly around in the air while waiting to land,” Mabruri said as reported by tribunnews.com on Saturday, adding that the delay had caused hundreds of passengers to crowd the airport, waiting for their flights.

Sutopo said the haze had even been spreading to neighboring countries, making the air quality in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore worse.

He said that his institution helped by a number of countries, including Australia, Singapore, Malaysia and Russia, had been working to extinguish the fire that has been razing forests in Sumatra and Kalimantan.

Meanwhile, the Jakarta sky also looked darker on Saturday morning. Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) officer Tomi Ilham Reza confirmed that the visibility in the Jakarta declined on Saturday morning. He did not, however, explain in detail about the visibility.

“We are monitoring haze movements because of air pollution,” Tomi said, adding that dust particles were moving from Banten to Jakarta. He could not, however, confirm that the air pollution was caused by forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan.

“In Banten, the visibility was 5 kilometers, while in Jakarta, the impact was is not so significant,” he added. (bbn)(+)


Garuda chalks up profits in Q3 despite haze woes
The Jakarta Post 24 Oct 15;

National flag carrier Garuda Indonesia maintained a net profit in the first nine months of the year, a rebound from last year’s loss although flight cancellations caused by haze in Sumatra and Kalimantan undermined its financial condition, an executive has said.

“As we were affected in the third quarter [by the haze], the net income is still significant compared with last year,” Garuda Indonesia president director Arif Wibowo said on Friday.

Its net income year-to-date (YTD) stood at US$51.4 million as of September, a significant increase from the $220.1 million loss over the same period last year.

He estimated that the company’s potential losses could reach $8 million, even though it still posted $2.845 billion in total revenue as of September, slightly up from $2.831 billion in the same period last year.

“Our revenue has been hampered by the haze, the volcano [eruption] and other incidents. Our opportunity loss almost hit $8 million, with $6 million being passenger-related. We could have grown [our revenue] by 5 percent,” he said.

Over the past few months, provinces such as Riau, Jambi, North Sumatra, South Sumatra and Central Kalimantan have been struggling with smoke from man-made and natural land and forest fires.

The ongoing disaster has hampered a lot of flights as the worst-hit areas experience very limited visibility. In Pontianak, West Kalimantan, visibility stood at 250 meters on Oct. 22, while airport authorities generally need a minimum visibility of 1,500 meters to give aircraft landing or take-off clearance.

He also added that the recent Mount Raung eruption had also negatively impacted the company’s revenue stream.

Garuda chief financial officer Ari Askhara added that so far, the company had spent at least $3 million dollars on compensation for passengers in August and September.

Garuda still banked profits from various measures aimed to reduce operational costs by boosting efficiency and benefiting from a lower fuel price.

The company managed to decrease its total expenses in the first nine months this year to $2.72
billion from $3.08 billion in the same period last year.

“If we have a good network, good flight deployment, crew scheduling, crew rotation, it will minimize costs. We have also done economical refueling, where we detect places with higher fuel prices and try to refuel in places with lower prices,” Arif said.

He also said that the company had optimized planes, to minimize losses from aircraft deployment.

Garuda recorded positive passenger growth, with 17.69 million passengers flying with the airline in the first nine months of the year, compared with 15.56 million passengers in the same period last year.

Its share in the domestic market has also rose to 44 percent in the first nine months compared with 37 percent in the same period last year, while its share in foreign markets reached 28 percent compared with 22 percent last year.

Garuda will also boost its flight frequency for umrah (minor pilgrimage to Mecca), as operating revenue from non-scheduled airlines from umrah, among others, made up 6.20 percent of its total operating revenue.

“We want to increase services to five times a day from current three times daily,” Arif said, adding that the company has also taken advantage of its participation in haj pilgrimage flights. The company also remained upbeat that the fourth-quarter peak season would help it reach its targeted revenue of around $4 billion by the end of the year.

“It’s tough with a rupiah depreciation that has hit 12 percent. But even if revenue is down, if the costs are down, as they are at the moment, we still book a profit,” Ari said. (fsu)



Indonesia readies warships for haze evacuation
The government has decided to send ships to haze affected provinces to evacuate victims, especially children and women, if necessary.
Channel NewsAsia 24 Oct 15;

JAKARTA: Indonesia has put warships on standby to evacuate people affected by acrid haze from forest fires which has killed at least 10 and caused respiratory illnesses in half a million, officials said on Saturday (Oct 24).

For nearly two months, thousands of fires caused by slash-and-burn farming in Indonesia have choked vast expanses of Southeast Asia, forcing schools to close and scores of flights and some international events to be cancelled.

The government has decided to send ships to haze-affected provinces to evacuate victims, especially children and women, if necessary, with two warships deployed to Kalimantan on Friday and another carrying medical workers and health equipment expected Saturday.

Military spokesman Tatang Sulaiman said the warships, which will be standing by in Banjarmasin, the capital of south Kalimantan, could serve as evacuation centres and hospitals for those affected by the haze.

Tatang said there was no immediate plan to bring people onboard but that could change if hospitals on land reach capacity or become overwhelmed.

"The ships are sent just in case children or pregnant women must be relocated from the local health facilities, it does not mean everyone would be put into the ships," Tatang said.

"So far health facilities on the ground in Kalimantan are still trying their best, we are just getting ready by deploying warships," Tatang said. Each warship can carry up to 2000 people and has 344 beds onboard.

"For now the ships will be standing by. We will begin evacuation when there is an instruction from the government," navy spokesman Muhammad Zainuddin told AFP.

'EXTRAORDINARY CRIME'

The government has deployed around 30 aircraft to fight the fires and for cloud seeding with 22,000 troops on the ground to combat the blazes.

Indonesian disaster mitigation agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said the fires had killed 10 people so far, some fighting the blazes while others died of respiratory illnesses or medical conditions exacerbated by the pollution.

"The impact of the forest fires has caused 10 people in Sumatra and Kalimantan to die, directly and indirectly," Nugroho said. The figure did not include seven hikers killed in a wildfire on Java last week.

The agency estimated at least half a million people have suffered from respiratory illness since the fires started in July and 43 million people have been affected in the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan.

Nugroho said the figure was likely just the tip of the iceberg because many people did not go to health facilities for treatment.

More than 1.7 million hectares (4.2 million acres) of land has been burned and six provinces severely affected by the haze, according to Indonesia's forestry ministry.

"This is due to human acts because 99 per cent of forest fires were started deliberately. This is an extraordinary crime against humanity," Nugroho said.

Other countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and Japan have sent assistance to help Indonesia fighting the forest fires.

With Malaysia, Singapore and parts of Thailand already affected, the Philippines on Friday said the haze had now spread there, disrupting air traffic and prompting warnings for residents to wear face masks.

- AFP/ec


Haze: Indonesian ships on evacuation alert
Carolyn Khew, Straits Times AsiaOne 24 Oct 15;

Indonesia has put a fleet of vessels from the navy and state-owned shipping firm PT Pelayaran Nasional Indonesia on high alert off Sumatra and Kalimantan, for a possible evacuation of babies and children due to the high levels of air pollution.

Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Luhut Pandjaitan said it will be the country's last resort if the two regions are rendered unliveable by the thick smoke from forest fires.

The Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) in various areas there has been hovering within the "hazardous" zone for most of this week.

In Singapore, hazy conditions are likely to persist today. The National Environment Agency (NEA) said yesterday that the 24-hour PSI for the next 24 hours is likely to be in the mid to high sections of the unhealthy range.

It may even enter the low end of the very unhealthy range if denser haze is blown in.

Visibility is also likely to be reduced, with the prevailing winds forecast to blow from the east or south-east, said the NEA.

As of 9pm yesterday, the 24-hour PSI was 136-158, in the unhealthy range, while the three- hour PSI was 239.

Ferry services between Batam Centre and Singapore were suspended briefly yesterday afternoon. Singapore River One, the organiser of this weekend's Singapore River Festival, said it will be postponed if the three-hour PSI level is above 300.


Indonesia set to evacuate kids in worst haze hit areas
Francis Chan, Straits Times AsiaOne 24 Oct 15;

A massive operation, both on land and at sea, is under way to prepare for what appears to be an imminent evacuation of thousands of babies and children from their homes in parts of Sumatra and Kalimantan.

This, as forest fires, which produce the toxic haze, continue to burn unabated despite the extensive firefighting resources dedicated to putting them out.

Indonesia yesterday put six navy ships on high alert off the waters of the two regions, which have been the worst hit by thick smoke from forest and peatland fires this year.

Together with a fleet of vessels from state-owned shipping firm PT Pelayaran Nasional Indonesia, they form the last resort in the event that cities need to be evacuated after being rendered unliveable owing to high levels of air pollution.

"We are doing this by way of a military operation for the sake of humanity," said Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Luhut Pandjaitan.

Air pollution levels continued to soar in Sumatra and Kalimantan, with the Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) in various areas in the two regions hovering within the "hazardous" zone for most of this week.

Yesterday, the PSI for Palangkaraya in Central Kalimantan jumped off the charts on Indonesia's Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency website, which has a maximum reading of 2,000 PSI. It peaked at 2,251 PSI at 4pm and never went below 1,045 PSI. In Jambi, Central Sumatra, the PSI peaked at 914 but fell to 531 at 6pm.

In Indonesia, anything above 350 is deemed hazardous.

The haze, exacerbated by an extended dry spell, has affected millions across South-east Asia.

In Thailand yesterday, air pollutant levels stayed in the unhealthy range although they dipped from the day before, when parts of the south saw the worst haze in years.

As of 3pm, the PM10 reading - which measures particles up to 10 microns in diameter - for Songkhla province was 249 per cubic m, from 369 on Thursday; in Satun, it was 203 from 273; in Yala, 142 from 172; and in Pattani, it was 149 from 216.

In Malaysia, schools were allowed to reopen yesterday except for those in Perlis, Perak and Penang, where pollution continues to worsen.

At least eight airports across the Philippines have grounded planes without instruments that will allow pilots to land and take off in low to near-zero visibility.

As a humanitarian crisis looms in Indonesia, Mr Luhut said measures to alleviate the suffering of people affected by the haze will be prioritised for infants and children.

At least four babies and a young child have died after suffering from lung infections, while more than 450,000 people have suffered from haze-related illnesses.

Mr Luhut said he is requesting more waterbombers to join the multinational assistance team fighting the fires. "We have secured nine (of the initial 15 aircraft planned) and they will be operational in 10 days or earlier," he said.

"We are also approaching Canada, the US and France (for help)."

Top on Indonesia's wishlist is still the Russian-made Beriev Be-200, capable of hauling 12,000 litres of water. "If we can get another five, that would be good," said Mr Luhut.

He was speaking to the press after a meeting with President Joko Widodo at the Presidential Palace to finalise the emergency plans yesterday.

Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture Puan Maharani, who was also at the meeting, added that emergency shelters, complete with air purifiers, are being set up at public buildings across Indonesia to offer refuge for people affected by the haze.

These are meant to be the first gathering sites in the event that conditions worsen, or for people who refuse to evacuate to the ships or cannot make it out to sea, added Mr Luhut.

"We have taken measures, but it is impossible to put out the fires over the next one to three weeks as our efforts should go hand in hand with rain."