Drone Water Spray Deployed to Help Extinguish Karhutla in Mount Bromo

JAKARTA - The East Java Regional Disaster Management Agency (BPBD) has deployed water spray and fire trucks to help extinguish forest and land fires (karhutla) in the Bromo Mountain area.

Head of the East Java BPBD, Gatot Soebroto, said the fire was first reported on Monday (3/8) at around 17.00 WIB in the Ranu Pani area, Probolinggo Regency.

"It went out for a while the next day, but it re-ignited during the day and continued until now," he said, quoted by ANTARA, Thursday, August 6.

The joint team that went to the field used two extinguishing strategies, namely at the bottom of the cliff, an extinguishing was carried out by operating one unit of a 150-liter capacity water spray drone and one BPBD East Java tank truck.

"On the top of the cliff, the joint officers carried out manual extinguishing with caragepyok," he said.

"We also deployed one fire unit and one L300 car loaded with water tanks to support water supply at the location," he said.

Based on data from the BPBD East Java Pusdalops, he said, on Thursday (6/8) the temporary area affected by the fire reached approximately 70 hectares.

"The burned vegetation includes mountain firs, mentigen, acacia, and shrubs. So far there have been no reports of casualties," said Gatot.

According to him, officers faced a number of obstacles in the field because the fire point was on the slope of the Bromo Caldera with a steep contour and accompanied by strong winds, so that the fire quickly spread to the higher cliff.

As a follow-up step, he said, the Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park (TNBTS) has closed part of the Bromo Mountain tourist area since Monday, August 3, 2026 at 22.00 WIB. The closure was also carried out at the entrance from the direction of Malang Regency and Lumajang Regency until an undetermined time.

Gatot said that the East Java BPBD together with joint officers consisting of the Probolinggo Regency BPBD Team, the Malang Regency BPBD Team, Polhut, TNBTS, TNI, Polri and fire-care volunteers immediately went to the location.

"BPBD East Java continues to coordinate with TNBTS, BPBD Probolinggo Regency, BPBD Malang Regency, Polhut, and volunteers, to accelerate handling and monitoring in the field. The weather conditions at the location are currently cloudy," said Gatot Soebroto.

According to him, today Thursday (6/8) BNPB will provide support by deploying a helicopter that was brought from Palangka Raya, to accelerate the fire extinguishing in Bromo. "Hopefully this support can accelerate the process of extinguishing the fire that occurred in Bromo," he said.