City told to prepare for earthquakes

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Jakarta is not among quake-prone regions, but it must prepare for the destructive impact that earthquakes may exert on high-rise buildings.

A seminar Wednesday told the city to make buildings earthquake-ready, improve seismic risk assessment and quickly alert residents about quake activity.

The seminar aimed to evaluate existing disaster policies and improve earthquake safety awareness.

Jakarta Governor Sutiyoso said, at the opening of the event held at City Hall, that the city was vulnerable to earthquakes because of subsurface instability and buildings that were not up to modern earthquake standards.

"We must therefore set a new standard for building construction here; the buildings must be able to withstand quakes measuring up to 9 on the Richter scale."

According to the governor, most Jakarta buildings were high tech and built with underlying soil conditions in mind.

However, even modern buildings would not necessarily be able to tolerate a quake measuring eight plus on the Richter scale, said the head of the city's building planning and control agency, Hari Sasongko.

"It's very costly to prepare (buildings) to withstand the more powerful earthquakes, and it will require redesign," he told reporters on the sidelines of the seminar.

He added that all buildings with permits were already in line with current earthquake risk compliance standards.

In a presentation, coordinator of the city administration's building construction consulting team, Widyanyana Merati, said that Jakarta should conduct a detailed seismic disaster risk assessment involving the formulation of strategic plans for anticipating and mitigating the impacts of quakes.

Widyanyana also said the administration should prepare a system for issuing community alerts and facilitate the development of an emergency rescue system.

Head of the data and geophysics information center of the Meteorological and Geophysics Agency, Sunarjo, told the audience in the event of an earthquake-triggered tsunami, Jakarta could minimize the number of victims by publicizing news of earthquakes as soon as possible after their occurrence.

"The information could be delivered via SMS, email or fax in less than five minutes."

But this type of emergency notification system would only be available, he said, after completion of the Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System (year-end 2008 completion date).

Within the last two years, Jakarta residents have felt the vibrations of three earthquakes whose epicenters were far from the capital: the 7.2 magnitude earthquake in Pangandaran, West Java, in July 2006; the 7.5 magnitude earthquake in Indramayu, also in West Java, last August; and the 8.4 magnitude earthquake in Bengkulu earlier this month.

In Jakarta, none of these earthquakes caused significant structural damage or claimed human life. (11)

Emergency numbers in case of earthquakes

Crisis center : (021)3822212, 3500000, 3862022

Fax: (021)3862022 and (021)3823412

SMS: 0811 920 203

Ambulance : 118

Fire department : 113, 344, 1309, 7507

PLN (power company) : 123

Tollway operator : 801, 1735

Search and Rescue : 115, 550, 1111, 2111

Police : (021)5250110, 3857974, 110, 112, 525

Red Cross (PMI) : (021)3906666, 7992325