BMKG Changes Fire Strategy, Artificial Rain is Done Before Fire Appears

JAKARTA - The government is changing the strategy for handling forest and land fires by prioritizing prevention through weather modification operations before the fire point appears.

The head of BMKG Teuku Faisal Fathani said that the approach was implemented after a major fire in 2015.

"Now the approach is preventive. It does not wait for a fire point to appear, but is carried out when the peat groundwater surface begins to subside," he said at the Presidential Palace Complex, Jakarta, Tuesday, July 28.

BMKG utilizes groundwater level data from the Ministry of Environment and the information system of the Ministry of Forestry to determine the location of weather modification operations.

If the peat groundwater surface drops to a certain limit, artificial rain is carried out to keep the land saturated with water so that it is not easily flammable.

According to Faisal, this approach is able to drop millions of cubic meters of water into peat areas and help maintain soil moisture.

He assessed that this strategy made forest and land fires relatively more under control than before 2015.

"Now forest and land fires are relatively more controllable than before 2015," he said.