PETALING JAYA, Aug 21— Visibility in several areas, including the Klang Valley, took a dip as acrid smoke billowing from Indonesia agricultural and forest fires continued into the weekend.

The smoke from slash-and-burn activities caused skies over Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah and Sarawak to be blanketed with haze. However, no airports were ordered close nor flights rescheduled.

The Malaysian Meteorological Department reported visibility in Petaling Jaya had deteriorated from 8km in the morning to 5km before dusk. 

In Batu Embun, Pahang, visibility was reported to be at 1.5km yesterday morning, gradually improving to 6km just after noon.

Bintulu in Sarawak recorded visibility of 10km in the morning, which was drastically reduced to 1.6km at noon. However, it improved to 6km at 4pm.

The Air Pollutant Index reading for Port Klang stood at 76, Seberang Jaya 60, Nilai 65, Bintulu 49 and Kota Kinabalu 52 yesterday.

Cheras showed an increase from 69 at dawn to 82 at 3pm, both falling under “moderate” category, while in Batu Muda, the highest increase was recorded nationwide with 63 at dawn to 88 at 3pm.

In Kemaman, Terengganu, the API reading increased from 51 at dawn to 74 at 3pm.

The hotspots in Kalimantan also showed a decrease from Thursday’s 180 to 75 on Friday.

This news was a relief for many countries in the region as the Asean Secretariat in Jakarta, declared a “Level II” alert on Thursday after the number of hotspots rose above 150 for two consecutive days. 

Data collated by Asean Specialised Meteorological Centre showed an increasing number of hotspots from Aug 13, which peaked at almost 200 on Wednesday.

Indonesia’s Disaster Management Agency chief Sutopo Purwo Nugroho was reported to have said firefighting efforts would be more difficult next month, which he attributed to the El Nino phenomenon.

“Dry weather, which would reach it peak in September, would further complicate firefighting efforts,” he said.

He urged Indonesian authorities to actively deploy more water bombers over sites that are difficult for firefighters to reach.