On September 10, the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry and the YIARI Wildlife Rehabilitation Fund announced that they had rescued 6 orangutans from wildfires that were raging in West Kalimantan province on Borneo Island.
Among these 6 individuals, there are 2 pups still breastfeeding. This rescue operation raised the total number of orangutans removed from the fire area to 15 individuals in just the past month.
These rare orangutan individuals were trapped in a remote plantation area after wildfire completely cut off the way back to their natural habitat. At the time of discovery, a large fire was only about 200m away from where the orangutans were hiding.
The rescue team, with the support of local people and plantation workers, anesthetized the individuals to reduce stress and limit the risk of injury, and then transferred them all to the YIARI recovery center in Ketapang town.
This year's serious wildfires on Borneo and Sumatra islands are complicated due to the prolonged El Nino weather phenomenon in the dry season, burning hundreds of thousands of hectares of vegetation and blowing toxic smoke into neighboring countries such as Malaysia and Singapore.
The European Union (EU) Copernicus Atmospheric Surveillance Agency assessed that smog concentrations from wildfires in Indonesia in August were the worst in 24 years.
The Indonesian government has currently mobilized about 43,000 firefighters to participate in fighting the fire, and at the same time coordinated to receive helicopter support from international relief forces to strengthen water bomb drops to control the disaster.
