July 31, 2009
International: Haze from fires in Indonesia and Malaysia
Once again it has been hazy here in Kuala Lumpur, the morning and evening sun looking like a fuzzy red ball near the horizon. The Malaysian Department of Environment indicated that over 75% of the air quality monitors today were reading 'moderate' for PM10 according to their air pollution index.
While some of it is local, the main cause appears to be a large number of fires in Indonesia and some in Malaysia producing significant amounts of smoke. These fires are typically agricultural, related to plantations and forests, that occur during the dry season. Below are the MODIS Terra true color and aerosol optical depth (AOD) images (source: LAADS), where the dense grey smoke can be seen covering most of the middle of the island of Sumatra (Indonesia). The plume crosses the Strait of Malacca into the central and southern portion of peninsular Malaysia and off the east coast over the South China Sea. A larger image of the region reveals smoke also over East Malaysia on the island of Borneo. Aerosol optical depth values exceeded 1.0 in several regions of Malaysia and Indonesia, corresponding to the dense smoke.
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The Singapore Weather Information Portal has two products that give us more information on this event. On the left is the regional weather report. The red dots indicate haze at the weather stations, the pink numbers are low visibility, and the wind barbs are the prevailing winds; all confirming the smoke and haze. On the right is their regional haze map, with satellite-derived hot spots identified by the many red dots on Sumatra and Borneo (with a few in Malaysia). They have added a shaded area for what they call moderate haze.
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