Singkawang (ANTARA News) - The thick smog which for the past week had been blanketing West Kalimantan, has starting posing a serious nuisance to road traffic from and to Pontianak.

Indra, a resident of Pontianak said in Singkawang on Monday that he could not ride on his motorcycle in high speed when travelling from Pontianak to Singkawang in the morning hours because of very poor visibility.

"Riding on a motorcycle from Pontianak to Jungkat which is only 18 km away, one has to go slowly in view of the very poor visibility. The distance under normal conditions took only 15 minutes to cover, but now it takes almost one hour," he said.

After passing Jungkat, the fog became thinner but grew dense again in Sengkubang village only 85 km into the direction of Singkawang from Pontianak, although not as dense as before.

This condition prevailed until reaching Singkawang which is 150 km from Pontianak.

Singkawang was also covered with smog as the result of bush fires around the city, and fog carried by wind from Sambas and Bengkayang regencies.

According to head of forest protection agency of the West Kalimantan Forestry Office Sunarno said in Sambas on Friday that the NOAA satellite has spotted 22 hot spots.

"It is only reasonable that the smog in the northern cost of West Kalimantan is quite thick as bush fires have become rampant in the region," he said.

In the meantime on Saturday (Oct 1), the satellite was unable to detect the hot spots because West Kalimantan was practically covered with fog.

Although the smog was quite thick, Singkawang residents mostly did not wear a mask to protect themselves from upper respiratory infection.