Australia to send aircraft and 20 firefighters to East Kalimantan
Indonesia will receive two Australian aircraft and 20 firefighting personnel for operations in East Kalimantan from November 6 through 12, 2026, as it confronts what Reuters described as its most intense wildfires in 11 years.
Aircraft to join Indonesia's fire response
Australian Ambassador to Indonesia Roderick Bruce Brazier outlined the deployment at Jakarta's Halim Perdanakusuma Airport on Thursday, November 5. Australia will supply a C-130 Large Air Tanker operated by the New South Wales Rural Fire Service Australia, along with a Cessna Citation scout aircraft.
Brazier said the tanker could release up to 15,000 liters of water on each sortie and was expected to fly about six sorties a day.
Indonesia has already committed aircraft to firefighting across the country. As of November 3, the National Agency for Disaster Countermeasures (BNPB) said it was deploying 51 aircraft and helicopters, Tempo reported. Thirty were assigned to water bombing, while 21 were on standby for patrols and Weather Modification Operations.
BNPB also said it had distributed 19,500 kilograms of dry ice and NaCl across three provinces, triggering rain in several areas.
Why East Kalimantan was selected
BNPB head Lieutenant General Kristomei Sianturi said Indonesian and Australian technical teams assessed where assistance was needed before agreeing on East Kalimantan. The agency ranked the province second only to Central Kalimantan in its need for additional firefighting support.
East Kalimantan is also among BNPB's remaining priority regions for forest-fire response, according to Tempo. The others are South Papua, South Sumatra, Central Kalimantan, East Nusa Tenggara, Southeast Sulawesi and Central Sulawesi.
Brazier said the deployment followed talks about possible assistance between Indonesia's Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs, Dudung Abdurachman, and Australian Minister of Home Affairs Tony Burke. He credited close bilateral cooperation for making the operation possible.
BNPB formally welcomed the humanitarian assistance. Thanking Australia, Sianturi described it as a symbol of friendship. "As President Prabowo Subianto said, good friends help each other in difficult times," he said.
Brazier pointed to a history of mutual help in disaster mitigation, recalling that BNPB and the Indonesian military assisted Australia during forest fires in 2020.
Widespread fires and health impacts
Reuters reported on November 5 that large areas had burned, primarily on Sumatra, Borneo and Papua. Health Ministry figures cited by Reuters linked fires and haze to more than 400,000 cases of acute respiratory infections in seven provinces as of November 2.
Nationally, BNPB recorded 864 hotspots as of November 4 and reported 1,615 hectares of land under mitigation, according to ANTARA. Central Kalimantan accounted for 425 hotspots, a 50 percent increase, and 664 hectares under mitigation.
South Sumatra recorded 60 hotspots, up 186 percent, with 105 hectares under mitigation. In Jambi, the hotspot count rose 134 percent to 150, while the area under mitigation totaled 403 hectares.
The firefighting effort also suffered a fatal crash on Wednesday, November 4. A waterbombing helicopter went down in Central Kalimantan on Borneo, killing one crew member and injuring five others, Reuters reported, citing the Indonesian military. The military said two remaining officers had not yet been evacuated.