Recently, videos of Indonesian firefighters doing cartwheels of joy and bowing deeply on the ground have been drawing attention.
This is because a long-awaited rain finally fell after about 100 days, following months of suffering from the worst wildfires and haze.
It is reported that Indonesia experienced its worst wildfires in 11 years, with the area burned reaching approximately 1.92 million hectares by late September—32 times the size of Seoul—and over 350,000 cases of acute respiratory diseases occurring due to the toxic haze.
The wildfires have reportedly remained uncontained for months due to extreme droughts caused by El Niño, reckless forest clearing by corporations, and the resulting creation of peatlands that make once-ignited fires extremely difficult to extinguish.
Amid this situation, welcome rain fell in some regions on the 25th and 26th, thinning the dense toxic haze and improving the air quality considerably.
However, the fires are not completely over yet due to embers remaining underground.
Experts predict that complete extinguishment will only be possible in November, when the rainy season officially begins.
(Reported by Lee Byung-ho | Produced by Yang Hyun-yi | Video Editing by Kim Min-ji | Design by Sumin | Production: Morning Wide 3)
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