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Fires on Borneo and Sumatra
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Fires on Borneo and Sumatra |
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Since mid-August, fires have been burning off and on in southern Borneo, and a blanket of smoke has been drawn over the island. Most of the island is occupied by the Kalimantan region of Indonesia, with the southern coastal areas originally home to lowland rainforests, peat swamp forests, and wetland areas. Degradation of these landscapes through unregulated and illegal logging, as well as intentional and accidental fire is a severe environmental and social problem for the country. In this image captured on October 11, 2004, by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite, thick smoke nearly hides the southern part of the island, and active fires detected by MODIS are marked in red. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided by the MODIS Rapid Response team. |
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Fires on Cape York Peninsula
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Fires on Cape York Peninsula and New Guinea |
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Across the lowlands of southern New Guinea, numerous fires (marked in red) were burning on October 11, 2004, when this image was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite. The island is occupied by two different nations: the western (left) half by the Indonesian territory of Irian Jaya and the eastern (right) half by Papua New Guinea. The image is roughly centered on the boundary between the two, and fires are burning across both countries. Both countries are struggling to control illegal logging. The Website of the Food and Agriculture Organization [ http://www.fao.org/forestry/foris/webview/forestry2/index.jsp?siteId=5081&sitetreeId=18927&langId=1&geoId=0 ] of the United Nations reports that some estimates suggest that 40 to 60 percent of the industrial roundwood in Indonesia is not legally harvested. In Papua New Guinea, logging continues, despite an official ban on logging exports, according to information from the U.S. State Department. [ http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2797.htm ] Whether these particular fires are related to illegal logging is unknown, but often fire is used by timber operators and tree plantation owners to degrade undisturbed rainforest in the hopes of gaining concessions to the land. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data obtained from the MODIS Rapid Response team. |
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