15 Government Aircraft Standby For Weather Modification Over The Karhutla Disaster

Illustration. Helicopter operators prepare fire extinguishers from the air aka water bombing in South Kalimantan on Saturday 31 August 2019. (Antaranews-Bayu P S)

JAKARTA - The government has prepared 15 aircraft to be alerted for weather modification as an effort to suppress or avoid forest and land fires aka forest and land fires in the country. Minister of Environment and Forestry (LHK) Siti Nurbaya said, so far there have been seven provinces that have implemented forest and land emergency status. "There are 15 aircraft units on standby from the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN), the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB), as well as from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK)," he said in a statement quoted in Jakarta, Wednesday.

Siti detailed that the seven provinces are Riau, South Sumatra, Jambi, West Kalimantan, East Nusa Tenggara, Central Kalimantan, and South Kalimantan. Meanwhile, from April to June 2023, Siti said the government had modified the weather in Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, East Nusa Tenggara, and West Kalimantan.

The application of weather modification technology, which used to be known as artificial rain technology, is part of efforts to prevent forest and land fires by wetting peat.

The government has assigned private companies to deal with peat forest fires that occur around the area owned by the private company. Siti revealed that a somewhat different pattern of forest fires occurred in Riau. The forest that caught fire was usually intense from March to April, then it fell in the following month. Then forest and land fires rose again in June. The disaster continued to move up until August and reached its highest position in mid-September. "Currently entering June, starting in the summer," he said. The Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) predicts this year's dry season will be the same as in 2019. A total of 28 percent of the territory of Indonesia or 194 Seasonal Zones (ZOM) has entered the dry season in June 2023.

Head of BMKG Dwikorita Karnawati said that the phenomenon of El Nino which is getting stronger with the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) towards positive can trigger drought during the dry homecoming in Indonesia.