Dept: Dry weather expected to resume next week

PETALING JAYA: The recent spell of rain in some parts of Selangor will soon come to an end, said the Malaysian Meteorological Depart­ment (MMD).

According to its senior officer Ambun Dindang, rain is expected to last only until the end of the week.

“The recent rains have really helped in reducing the haze, resulting in the air pollutant index registering at good and moderate levels.

“However, the situation will last only until this weekend. By next week, we expect dry weather from the southwestern monsoon.”

Ambun said peninsular Malaysia and the western parts of Sarawak would experience warmer temperatures, but Sabah would remain unaffected.

“The dry spell will probably last until September but within that period, there will be rain. It won’t be totally dry but compared to other seasons, it will be relatively drier.”

On possible water shortage in the Klang Valley, Ambun assured residents that cloud seeding would continue.

“It’s an ongoing programme, but to be successful, we need suitable clouds. In this case, cloud monitoring is done on a daily basis.”

The number of open burning cases in the country continues to rise from 4,007 on July 5 to 4,408 on Tuesday and 4,413 yesterday.

This time, Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Seri G. Palanivel said the breakdown was agricultural areas (1,436 cases), undergrowth (1,013 cases), forested areas (898 cases), construction sites (137 cases), garbage dump (77 cases) and industrial areas (34 cases).

Satellite imagery by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Admini­stration had also detected 132 hotspots in Sumatra and 87 in Kalimantan on Wednesday.

“There were also eight hotspots in the country – seven in Sarawak and one in Perak,” he said, adding that the forest fire in Gunung Jambusan, Sarawak, had yet to be completely doused.