Key facts
- Skies over Palangkaraya turned deep orange on Wednesday night.
- Kuala Lumpur and Singapore were ranked the world's most polluted major cities on Thursday.
- East Timor closed schools for three days due to the haze.
- Fires have burned hundreds of thousands of hectares of forest and plantations in Indonesia.
- Indonesia attempted cloud seeding with dry ice over South Sumatra on Thursday.
Thick haze from ongoing wildfires in Indonesia has blanketed cities, turning skies orange and yellow and leading to regional air pollution concerns. Palangkaraya on Borneo island experienced deep orange skies on Wednesday night, with visibility reduced to a few dozen meters. Kuala Lumpur and Singapore topped global pollution rankings on Thursday, followed by Indonesian cities Medan and Jakarta. The severe haze has prompted East Timor to close schools for three days. The fires, burning for months and exacerbated by a strong El Nino-driven drought, have scorched hundreds of thousands of hectares across Sumatra, Borneo, and Papua, affecting air quality in Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, and East Timor. Indonesia has deployed thousands of firefighters and attempted cloud seeding with dry ice in an effort to combat the blazes. Experts attribute much of the haze to peatland fires, which are difficult to extinguish once ignited and are worsened by deforestation and peatland drainage.