2026 Southeast Asian haze

Rare card · No. 35041

The 2026 Southeast Asian haze crisis is an air pollution event and the current continuous transboundary haze season that is affecting several countries in Southeast Asia since August 2026, including Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Timor Leste, and Singapore. As wildfires are also happening in Papua New Guinea, the haze has affected the country as well as causing transboundary haze to Australia and several islands of Eastern Indonesia including Lesser Sunda, Maluku, Papua and Sulawesi. The haze is also suspected to have reached southern Vietnam and Nicobar Islands, India. This particular haze season was severely exacerbated by a record-strength El Niño climate cycle. Triggering the highest-level environmental alerts across the region, the dense particulate smog has blanketed neighbouring nations, resulting in widespread school closures, flight cancellations, and hundreds of thousands of respiratory illness cases. The environmental disaster has significantly strained...

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