Southeast Asia seems to have a permanent rendezvous with disasters. First it was the haze in Indonesia and now it is the oil spill in Singapore. About 25,000 tonnes of fuel oil spilled into the Singapore Strait on October 15 when the Cyprus-registered tanker Evoikos collided with the Thai-registered Orapin Global ( Down To Earth , Vol 6, No 12). Rescue operations involved nearly 50 boats to clean up Singapore's worst oil spill.

Port authorities in Singapore dispatched a helicopter on October 18, to which a spraying machine was attached, to spread chemicals designed to break up oil slicks floating in the waters of southwest Singapore. Helicopters could not be used earlier because of the thick haze from the forest fires burning in neighbouring Indonesia which blanketed Singapore. Japan had flown in skimmers