Indonesia fires forces closure of schools and airport

Smoke from raging wildfires causes poor visibility and pollution on Sumatra island

• 

  A woman covers her face as haze from wildfires blankets Pekanbaru in Indonesia's Riau province on Sumatra island. Authorities closed an airport on the island on September 13, 2019 due to poor visibility caused by smoke from the fires. AP Photo

• 

  Motorists ride through a road blanketed by haze from wildfires in Pekanbaru, Riau province, Indonesia. AP Photo

• 

  Smouldering peatland in Kampar, Riau after a fire that swept through the area was stopped from moving further by a road. AFP

• 

  Women wearing pollution masks gather for special prayers in Pekanbaru to ask for asking for rain to counter the forest fires and clear the toxic haze covering large areas of Indonesia and neighbouring Malaysia. AFP

• 

  Men wear pollution masks at special prayers asking for rain in Pekanbaru, Riau province. AFP

• 

  Indonesian firefighters spray water to extinguish a fire in Kampar, Riau province. The number of blazes in Indonesia's rainforests has jumped sharply, satellite data showed, spreading smog across South-East Asia and adding to concerns about the impact of increasing wildfire outbreaks worldwide on global warming. AFP

• 

  Firefighters spray water to extinguish a fire in Kampar, Riau province. AFP

• 

  Officials look at monitors displaying the current haze situation at the Malaysian air quality monitoring centre in Putrajaya. Indonesia. AFP

• 

  Tourists take a picture from the Skybox in Kuala Lumpur Tower as the Malaysian capital is shrouded in haze caused by the fires in Indonesia. AP Photo

Indonesian authorities closed an airport on Indonesia's Sumatra island on Friday due to poor visibility caused by smoke from raging fires burning through peatland, while schools in several provinces closed due to the hazardous haze.

Fluctuating visibility that at times was just 300 metres forced airlines to postpone flights to the main airport in Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau province, said Yogi Prasetyo, the airport's executive general manager. Poor visibility had also caused delays at an airport in Dumai, another city in Riau.

Worsening haze meant more schools in Riau and Jambi provinces were closing, education office officials there said. Health offices in both provinces showed more than 300,000 people suffered respiratory illnesses since the haze began and officials said more people have been seeking medical help for respiratory ailments in recent weeks.

Women wear pollution masks during a special prayers asking for rain in Pekanbaru, Riau province on September 13, 2019. AFP

Nearly every year, Indonesian forest fires spread health-damaging haze across the country and into neighboring Malaysia and Singapore. The fires are often started by smallholders and plantation owners to clear land for planting.

Many areas of Indonesia are prone to rapid burning because of the draining of swampy peatland forests for pulp wood and palm oil plantations.

Indonesia's Disaster Mitigation Agency said late on Thursday that there were more than 3,600 hotspots on Sumatra and Borneo islands, leading to very poor air quality in six provinces with a combined population of more than 23 million.

It said 37 helicopters have dropped nearly 240 million litres of water and more than 160,000 kilograms of salt for cloud seeding as part of the firefighting efforts.

Indonesian authorities have deployed more than 9,000 people to fight the fires, which have razed more than 328,700 hectares of land across the nation, with more than half in the provinces of Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan and South Kalimantan.

Record Indonesian forest fires in 2015 spread haze across a swath of South-East Asia, and according to a study by Harvard and Columbia universities, hastened 100,000 deaths.