Why Southeast Asia's Haze Crisis Is the Worst in Over a Decade

Thick haze has blanketed parts of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and other neighbouring countries since August 2026, according to Reuters reporting republished by ThePrint and a Wikipedia summary of the event. The smoke originates mainly from forest and peatland fires on the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Borneo (Kalimantan), which are covered in dense tropical forest and carbon-rich peat soils that burn easily once dried out.

What is driving the fires: El Niño and the Indian Ocean Dipole

Reuters reporting carried by ThePrint describes the region as under the influence of a severe super-El Niño, a climate pattern linked to warmer Pacific surface waters that brings extra heat and reduced rainfall to Southeast Asia; the same report says the last comparably severe El Niño year was 2015. Indonesia's dry season normally runs from April to October. The Wikipedia entry on the 2026 Southeast Asian haze describes this El Niño event as the strongest on record, and separately notes a positive Indian Ocean Dipole added further risk, together leaving vegetation and peatlands unusually susceptible to fire.

Human land-clearing adds to the natural drying effect. The Reuters explainer notes that deforestation to expand palm oil and other crops has drained peatland water tables over the years, leaving soil drier and more flammable even before this year's El Niño set in.

How large are the fires

Figures on the area burned vary by source, a discrepancy the Reuters report itself flags. Indonesia's official count stood at about 202,000 hectares as of July. The environmental monitoring group Auriga put the January–August total at more than 637,000 hectares, while the monitoring platform Nusantara Atlas estimated nearly 900,000 hectares burned — close to nine times the land area of Singapore. Indonesia's Forestry Ministry recorded 799 active hotspots nationwide as of the evening of October 15, 2026, up sharply from 372 the day before, according to a wire report carried by ABC News; more than three-quarters of those hotspots were concentrated in six fire-prone provinces on Sumatra and Borneo.

Deaths on the fire line

The human cost extends beyond air pollution. On October 15, 2026, a wildfire trapped a 12-member firefighting team — made up of national park staff, a community fire brigade and local volunteers — in the Mentigen and Pusung Lingker areas of Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park in East Java's Probolinggo regency, according to the ABC News wire report. Four people died and two others suffered severe burns after being cut off by dense smoke and fast-moving flames; rescuers had to carry victims roughly two kilometres on stretchers because steep terrain blocked vehicle access. Contributing factors cited in the report include strong winds, El Niño-driven dryness, and water shortages that hampered firefighting.

Health impact and air quality across the region

Respiratory illness linked to the fires has risen steeply inside Indonesia. The Reuters explainer, citing Indonesian health data, reports 283,270 respiratory-illness cases across seven provinces as of October 13 — more than double the 113,336 cases recorded as of September 9. Pollution indices in parts of Sumatra and Borneo exceeded 300 and in some locations topped 1,000.

The Wikipedia summary of the event, drawing on regional reporting, lists air-quality readings across the wider haze outbreak: Malaysia's Sarawak state recorded an Air Pollutant Index of 302, within the 'hazardous' band, while a reading above 500 would trigger an emergency declaration. Singapore's Pollutant Standards Index peaked at 227 in central areas, with PM2.5 levels of 288 recorded in the west of the island, in what the same source describes as the 'very high' band. Brunei-Muara district in Brunei recorded a PSI of 215.

Countries reported as affected by the smoke include Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, East Timor, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam and Papua New Guinea, according to the Wikipedia summary. Nearly 2,000 flights within Indonesia were disrupted and schools were closed in multiple regions because of poor visibility and air quality, the Reuters account notes.

How governments are responding

Indonesia's National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) has been testing a method it calls dry-ice atmospheric modification to clear smoke rather than seed rain, according to a report from Antara News. On October 16, 2026, a Cessna Caravan aircraft flew two sorties at 4,500 feet over Palembang in South Sumatra, releasing a total of 1,600 kilograms of 3-millimetre dry-ice granules at minus 75 degrees Celsius to break up the smoke layer trapped near the ground. Berton S.P. Panjaitan, acting head of BNPB's Data, Information and Communication Center, described it as 'a specialized atmospheric modification technique designed to reduce pollution concentrations and dense smoke.' Visibility at Palembang's Sultan Mahmud Badaruddin II International Airport improved from 650 metres to 2,800 metres after the operation, and trials were set to continue through October 18, 2026, before authorities decide whether to expand the technique to other fire-affected provinces.

Elsewhere, the Wikipedia entry on the episode notes conventional cloud-seeding operations in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Brunei, the distribution of N95 masks, the opening of haze shelters, and the arrest of 162 people in Indonesia on suspicion of setting illegal land-clearing fires. Japan sent helicopters to assist, and Malaysia offered additional aid, according to the same summary.

When might the haze clear

Authorities quoted in the Reuters account say the haze will only be contained when there is sustained rainfall, and forecasts at the time pointed to a delay in the onset of rain until November, with El Niño effects expected to persist into early 2027. That timeline means the fire and haze season described in these reports could continue for several more weeks before seasonal rains bring meaningful relief.