TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Google has launched Public Alerts for information on natural disasters in Indonesia as a result of Google’s cooperation with the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG).
“In the early stage, we launch warnings for tsunami and earthquake in Indonesia,” said Meryl Stone, Head of Partnerships for Google Crisis Response, at Google Indonesia, Jakarta, on Monday, adding that there could be warnings for floods or landslide in the future.
Meryl said Internet users can access Public Alerts by visiting www.google.org/publicalerts. Users then can see the map of the country which they are at. “There are currently no disaster warning signs in Indonesia,” said Meryl.
Warning sign will be shown by Google in red and has information about the disaster when clicked. “The information is available in various languages and Indonesia is one of them,” said Meryl.
She continued that Indonesia is the eight country that can access Public Alerts, preceded by the United States, Canada, mexico, Colombia, Australia, Taiwan and Japan. “Japan also has tsunami signs,” she said.
Google Indonesia communication manager Jason Tedjasukmana said that cooperation with other government agencies such as the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPD) could be realized in the future. “This is to know where evacuation shelters are located,” said Jason.
Budi Prawira, access program manager Southeast Asia at Google, said Internet users can also access Public Alerts freely by typing *123*77# for Indosat users.
MARTHA WARTA SILABAN
