In Indonesia, a deadly inland earthquake exposes urgent preparedness gaps
As emergency teams respond to the 21 November earthquake that struck Indonesia’s main island of Java, killing more than 320 people and injuring thousands, survivors are asking why there was so little preparedness and awareness-raising beforehand.
Indonesia sees some of the world’s most powerful earthquakes, but many – including the 2004 Aceh earthquake and tsunami that left a quarter of a million dead – have their epicentre offshore and are megathrust: the result of one tectonic plate being forced underneath another.
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And Bahri said there had been no education campaigns to help residents become better prepared. “We only watched natural disasters on the news, thinking they were far from us, but now it happened on our soil,” he told The New Humanitarian. “We only use our instinct to run to open spaces or in the field.”
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The national disaster agency has issued guidelines in conjunction with other ministries and civil society – including on how to build earthquake-proof houses and safety instructions for schools – but Suryotomo said implementation has yet to achieve the desired results and a lot depended on chasing up the local authorities.
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More than 60,000 people were displaced by the Cianjur earthquake, and the response by the government and international NGOs has been rapid. Thousands of rescuers were deployed to pull people from the rubble, with hundreds more distributing aid. In the days since, nearly two dozen medical centres have been established.
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