Dozens of wildfires across Indonesia have exposed millions in the country to putrid haze and threatened the endangered Kalimantan orangutan, but video shared on social media appearing to show the great apes being evacuated is unrelated to the ongoing crisis. The clip was taken from footage originally published in March 2025 that showed orphaned orangutans being moved into a new rehabilitation centre that equips them with the skills they need to be reintroduced into the forest.
"Smoke silences the Voice of the Forest, One of Kalimantan's rare animals must be evacuated," says an Indonesian-language Instagram post uploaded on August 22, 2026.
The post, which also includes the hashtags "Pray for Kalimantan", "Save Orangutan" and "Stop forest fires", includes a video showing young orangutans riding a bus accompanied by several people wearing gloves and face masks.
The same video was also shared in similar TikTok posts.
The posts circulated as wildfires in Indonesia exposed millions to putrid haze and threatened the habitat of the Kalimantan orangutan, a critically endangered species whose population is believed to number some 57,350 individuals (archived here and here).
The forestry ministry says the wildfires burned more than 202,000 hectares (499,153 acres) of land between January and July, including nearly 95,000 hectares in July alone ( archived link).
Wildfires take hold in Indonesia every year during the dry season, with many blamed on slash-and-burn land-clearing practices for agriculture.
This year's fires have been supercharged by a powerful El Nino -- a naturally occurring climate phenomenon that brings worldwide changes in winds, air pressure and rainfall patterns ( archived link). The amount of land burned so far this year is more than previous El Nino seasons in 2019 and 2023.
At a palm-oil plantation in Ketapang Regency, West Kalimantan Province, which has been hard hit by the wildfires, an orangutan was found unconscious and struggling to breathe on August 30, digital outlet IDN Times reported ( archived link). It was the seventh orangutan rescued from the fires in Ketapang by the West Kalimantan Natural Resources Conservation Agency and Yayasan International Animal Rescue Indonesia.
The video circulating on social media, however, does not show orangutans being evacuated away from fires.
A reverse image search using keyframes from the falsely shared video found the footage was taken from a longer video uploaded by the Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS) Foundation across their official social media platforms, on March 19, 2025 (archived here and here).
"Our beloved orangutans in Nyaru Menteng's Rehabilitation Centre are being relocated to their new forest school," their Instagram post says.
These schools help equip orphaned orangutans with the skills they need to survive once they are old enough to be reintroduced to the forest ( archived link).
Jamartin Sihite, the chief executive officer of BOS, also told AFP the video was unrelated to wildfire rescues.
"That video shows the relocation of orangutans from the old forest school to the new forest school," he told AFP in an August 28 phone call.
He also said the spread of such misinformation could harm the effort to help orangutans.
"When people find out that the video was shared with the wrong narrative, their level of trust can decrease," he said.
AFP has also previously debunked other wildlife misinformation including AI-generated visuals of wild animals behaving like humans or pets, which experts warn can harm conservation efforts.