Exhausted volunteer firefighters fell to their knees and kissed the ground in Palangka Raya as intermittent rainfall brought a welcome respite from months of choking wildfires across Indonesia on Wednesday, October 29, 2026, even as officials warned that the dry season may not be over.
More than 11,000 people sought treatment for respiratory infections during the emergency. The crisis pushed Palangka Raya’s air quality index to a staggering 4,000 this month—more than 13 times the environment ministry’s hazardous threshold—while the capital of Central Kalimantan had been shrouded in a toxic haze driven by relentless land and forest fires that began in August. This smoke reached as far as Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, and East Timor.
Rain Brings Relief to Palangka Raya and Banjar Regency
Muhammad Jihan Alwi, a 23-year-old resident of Palangka Raya, used the reprieve to jog outdoors for the first time in months, breathing in fresh air that felt noticeably better than the day before.
In South Kalimantan, blazes had scorched more than 1,754 hectares of land during the first two weeks of October alone, with Banjar regency bearing the heaviest damage at 530.61 burned hectares. Volunteers who had spent roughly four months battling flames around Kaliukan and Sungai Alat villages finally caught a break.
We were overjoyed; every one of us volunteers was so happy that we prostrated ourselves in gratitude. Praise be to God that there was finally rain.
Lukman El Hakim, firefighter
Cloud Seeding Reduces PM2.5 Concentrations in Palangka Raya
The BNPB disaster agency reported that it is operating 61 planes and helicopters across six Indonesian provinces for cloud seeding and water bombing. Tri Handoko Seto, an official with the BMKG climatology agency, noted that light-to-heavy rains recently fell in Central Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, and South Sumatra, directly encouraged by those cloud-seeding missions.
PM2.5 concentrations in Palangka Raya have started to trend downward, moving from predominantly very unhealthy
and hazardous
levels down to the unhealthy
category compared to a week prior. In Banjarbaru, heavy rain on October 25 helped wet the parched land and ease smoke pollution, bringing the city’s air quality reading down to a moderate level with PM2.5 measuring 28.8 micrograms per cubic metre.
Dry Weather Keeps Wildfire Threats Alive
The BMKG warns that dry weather will continue to dominate for a while, keeping the threat of new wildfires alive. Seeding operations will continue in the hope that the rain can truly soak the burned peat areas down to below the surface, guarding against heat trapped underground that can reignite flames if the ground dries out before the peak of the rainy season arrives.
At least 11 people have died fighting the fires, including a 45-year-old forest ranger killed by a falling tree in North Toraja, South Sulawesi. Asep Safrudin, the national police’s top detective, reported that 245 individuals and 20 corporations have been named as suspects facing heavy fines and potential jail time. Nusantara Atlas estimates the fires consumed more than 1.9 million hectares in the nine months leading up to September, while experts attribute the widespread clearing to slash-and-burn practices largely driven by timber, palm oil, and mining companies.
Will the continued cloud-seeding operations manage to soak the burned peat areas thoroughly enough to prevent underground heat from reigniting the flames before the peak of the rainy season arrives?