The first problem is these fires cover vast swaths of remote land, with no easy access for fire fighting.
Secondly, these are not your normal fire, but instead they are peat fires, meaning the fire is burning meters underground.
And because they are peat fires, they can only be extinguished using massive amounts of water, sufficient water to saturate the area at least a meter down.
And that raises the final problem. Such large volumes of water are just not available.
So these fires will keep burning until the arrival of the monsoon, when nature will finally deliver enough water put out the burning land.
"Singapore and Malaysia have sent aircraft to Palembang in South Sumatra to help Indonesia fight forest fires. (snip) Australia announced on Saturday that it was sending a Hercules air tanker and a rural firefighting team."
Secondly, these are not your normal fire, but instead they are peat fires, meaning the fire is burning meters underground.
And because they are peat fires, they can only be extinguished using massive amounts of water, sufficient water to saturate the area at least a meter down.
And that raises the final problem. Such large volumes of water are just not available.
So these fires will keep burning until the arrival of the monsoon, when nature will finally deliver enough water put out the burning land.