Across the forests and peatlands of Indonesia, a dry season sharpened by a strong El Niño has burned a land area roughly eighteen times the size of London, and a satellite monitor now counts 2.88 million hectares scorched in 2026 through October. The total already outruns the worst full year on its record, a reminder that the old pattern of clearing and draining land leaves the country exposed whenever drought arrives. Behind the figures sits a quieter silence: the government has offered no official tally since July, so the story is still being written from smoke-hidden satellite images and fr
Indonesia's 2026 Fires Have Burned Nearly 2.9 Million Hectares, Monitor Says
Fires have sickened hundreds of thousands of people with local pollution and sent haze into Malaysia and Singapore.
"Basically, it's a really bad year."
Mark
Why does this number matter so much? Fires happen in Indonesia every year.
Mimi
Because 2.88 million hectares already tops 2019, the worst full year in this monitor's records, and the year isn't over. Nearly a million hectares were added just since September.
Luke
Worth being clear whose number this is. It's Nusantara Atlas, one monitor analyzing satellite imagery. It isn't an official tally.
Mark
And the government hasn't offered its own?
Mimi
Not since July, when it said 202,000 hectares had burned. The forestry ministry spokesman says updating needs in-depth confirmation and verification, and he gave no date.
Luke
So the gap between 202,000 and 2.88 million is partly a gap in timing. The July figure covers far less of the season. We can't say how the two methods would compare on the same dates.
Mark
Gaveau called his figure conservative. What does that mean?
Mimi
Smoke has blocked satellites from seeing some burned land. As it clears, scars should appear and the total should rise.
Luke
That's his expectation, and the reporting presents it as likely rather than measured. Same with 2015: the imagery was different, so we can't say whether 2026 is worse than that year.
Mark
What about the human side?
Mimi
Hundreds of thousands of people have been sickened by pollution, and haze reached Malaysia and Singapore.
Luke
The source gives that as a broad figure with no breakdown or source for the count, so treat it as approximate.
Il Polso
- Satellite analysis puts 2.88 million hectares of Indonesian land in flames, a figure that already tops the 2019 full-year record.
- Smoke so thick it hides burned ground from orbit means the real damage may be larger than what the imagery can show.
- Hundreds of thousands of people have fallen ill from local pollution, and haze is drifting across the border into Malaysia and Singapore.
- The government's last official number came in July at 202,000 hectares, and officials say they cannot yet say when revised estimates will be published.
- Rain has begun to tame the worst blazes and hot spots are easing, but burn scars still concealed under smoke are expected to surface in coming months.
Across the forests and peatlands of Indonesia, a dry season sharpened by a strong El Niño has burned a land area roughly eighteen times the size of London, and a satellite monitor now counts 2.88 million hectares scorched in 2026 through October. The total already outruns the worst full year on its record, a reminder that the old pattern of clearing and draining land leaves the country exposed whenever drought arrives. Behind the figures sits a quieter silence: the government has offered no official tally since July, so the story is still being written from smoke-hidden satellite images and from the breath of communities choking on haze. What will matter is whether the official count, when it comes, can be reconciled with what the sky has already shown.
On Wednesday, a satellite monitoring service called Nusantara Atlas told AFP that fires in Indonesia have burned 2.88 million hectares so far this year, about 7.1 million acres, roughly eighteen times the size of London. The count covers burning detected through the end of October, and it has grown by nearly a million hectares since the site's September update. It has already passed the full-year total for 2019, which had been the worst year on record in the data.
The number is, by its own founder's account, a conservative one. Thick smoke has veiled parts of the land from the satellites, so some burned ground remains unseen. David Gaveau put it plainly: it is a really bad year.
The government has said nothing new since July, when it reported 202,000 hectares razed. A forestry ministry spokesman says officials are still verifying revised estimates and cannot yet say when they will be released. The drought tied to a strong El Niño has made this dry season especially severe, and experts point to decades of deforestation and drained peatlands that left the land primed to burn.
The human cost is heavy. Hundreds of thousands of people have been sickened by local pollution, and haze has spread into Malaysia and Singapore. Rain has now brought some relief, and hot spots are beginning to level off. Yet the final burned area is likely to climb as scars hidden by smoke come into view, and the key question remains whether the official figures will match what the satellites have seen.
On Wednesday, a satellite-based monitor told AFP that fires in Indonesia have burned 2.88 million hectares, about 7.1 million acres, so far in 2026. That is roughly 18 times the area of London. The figure comes from Nusantara Atlas, a deforestation monitoring site, and it covers burning detected through the end of October.
The total has grown by nearly a million hectares, or 2.5 million acres, since the site's last update in September. It already surpasses the full-year figure for 2019, which Nusantara Atlas data had previously ranked as the worst year on record. Indonesia also suffered devastating fires in 2015, but the satellite imagery used then was different, so a direct comparison is difficult.
David Gaveau, the founder of Nusantara Atlas, cautioned that the number is a conservative estimate. Part of the reason is that smoke has obscured satellite images, hiding some burned ground from view. Even so, he said the scale of the destruction is clear. "Basically, it's a really bad year," he said.
There are no official figures to set beside the monitor's. Indonesia's government last announced a total at the end of July, when it said 202,000 hectares, or 499,000 acres, had been razed. It has not published an update since. Forestry ministry spokesman Ristianto Pribadi told AFP that officials are still working on revised estimates of fire-affected land. He said that updating the data requires in-depth confirmation and verification, and that the ministry cannot yet confirm when it will announce the results.
The fires have been fed in part by an intense drought linked to a strong El Niño. Indonesia has fires every dry season, but this year's have been especially severe. Experts also point to longer-term causes: decades of deforestation and the draining of peatlands for plantations, which have left large areas of land more vulnerable to burning.
The human toll has been considerable. The fires have caused severe local pollution that has sickened hundreds of thousands of people, and haze has drifted into neighboring countries, including Malaysia and Singapore.
There are signs of some relief. Rain has arrived and brought some of the worst blazes under control, and monitoring shows the number of hot spots beginning to flatten or decline. But the burned-area total is likely to climb. Some fires are still burning, and burn scars hidden beneath smoke should become visible to satellites in the coming months. What to watch next is whether the government publishes its own estimate, and how closely it matches the satellite count.
Citazioni salienti
Basically, it's a really bad year.— David Gaveau, founder of Nusantara Atlas
Updating the data on the size of land and forest fires-affected areas requires in-depth confirmation and verification.— Ristianto Pribadi, Indonesian forestry ministry spokesman
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