Indonesia battles rising wildfires amid dry season
JAKARTA, Indonesia: Four people died, and two others suffered serious burns while fighting a wildfire in a national park on Indonesia’s Java island after thick smoke and fast-moving flames trapped their team, officials said Friday.
The fire broke out in recent days in the Mentigen and Pusung Lingker areas of Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park in Probolinggo regency, East Java. Strong winds drove the flames quickly through dry vegetation, making firefighting efforts more dangerous.
The victims were part of a 12-member team of national park staff, community firefighters, and local volunteers. They were trying to control the blaze when some members became trapped, East Java police spokesperson Jules Abraham Abast said.
At about 1:30 p.m., firefighters working outside the danger zone received an emergency call from colleagues caught in thick smoke and advancing flames.
Rescuers later found three people dead and three others with severe burns at an evacuation point. One of the injured victims died while receiving medical treatment, Abast said.
Two volunteers remained in hospital with serious burns. They were transferred to Dr Soetomo General Hospital in Surabaya for specialized treatment. Six other team members escaped without injury.
Probolinggo police chief Asmida Rizki Siregar said the remote location and difficult terrain made rescue operations challenging. Emergency crews had to carry the victims on stretchers for about two kilometers because vehicles could not reach the site.
“The incident occurred in a remote mountainous area, complicating rescue efforts,” Siregar said.
Authorities completed the evacuation late on October 15 and launched an investigation into the deaths. Investigators are collecting evidence and questioning survivors to determine whether negligence or criminal wrongdoing contributed to the tragedy.
The latest fire follows a major blaze in August that burned nearly nine square kilometers of grassland and vegetation in the national park. The earlier fire also damaged protected edelweiss flowers, which grow in mountainous areas.
The deaths come as Indonesia steps up efforts to control forest and land fires, which have worsened this year amid a prolonged dry season. The El Niño weather pattern has contributed to dry conditions, while land clearance using fire has added to the problem in Indonesian Borneo and parts of Sumatra.
Water shortages have also made firefighting more difficult. Japanese crews have assisted as authorities struggle to contain fires across the country.
The Forestry Ministry recorded 799 fire hotspots nationwide by the evening of October 15, more than double the 372 reported a day earlier. More than three-quarters of the hotspots were concentrated in six fire-prone provinces across Sumatra and Borneo.
Official figures showed that more than 2,020 square kilometers of land burned between January and July, almost three times the size of Singapore.
The independent Nusantara Atlas project, which monitors fires using satellite images, estimated that nearly 8,960 square kilometers had burned across Indonesia by the end of August, highlighting the growing scale of the country’s wildfire problem.
Source – Indonesia News
