The volunteers risking their lives to defuse Indonesia's wildfire 'carbon bombs'
Volunteer firefighters in Indonesia are battling severe peatland wildfires in Borneo that are releasing massive amounts of stored carbon. These 'carbon bombs' are exacerbated by El Niño-driven drought conditions, creating a transnational haze crisis.
Why it matters
Peatland fires are a major contributor to global carbon emissions and represent a critical climate change feedback loop.
The volunteers risking their lives to defuse Indonesia's wildfire 'carbon bombs' The sky grows heavy in Borneo, though not with rain. The air, amber-hued and treacle-thick, is smudged under a blanket of smog that has spilled across international borders – to Singapore, Manila, Kuala Lumpur.
Down on the ground, smoke steams from the soil.
"It hits your nose straight away, your eyes burn – that's more or less what it's like," he says. "People say these fires are extraordinary because of the flames and the smoke. And they're right."
The 35-year-old volunteer firefighter has spent more than a month enveloped in this haze, breathing toxic millennia-old microparticles of carbon as he toils against a seemingly inextinguishable fire front.
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