Bali Needs 10 More Tsunami Warning Sirens: Agency

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Bali Disaster Mitigation Agency has proposed the installment of 10 more tsunami warning sirens in the resort island's waters to strengthen disaster mitigation, preparedness, and responses.

"Dewa Putu Mantera, the agency's acting head, has ever proposed the procurement of ten more sirens of Indonesia's Tsunami Early Warning System (Ina-TEWS)," Head of the Bali Disaster Mitigation Agency I Made Rentin said on Sunday.

Those tsunami warning sirens would be installed in the Candi Kusuma, Yeh Ebang, Surabrata, Yeh Gangga, and Peti Tenget Beaches in the western areas coastal areas of Bali as well as five other beaches in the island's eastern coastal areas.

The beaches that would receive the tsunami warning sirens were Lebih, Kusamba, Padang Bai Port, Candi Desa, and Jasi, Rentin said, adding that the Bali provincial government had proposed the installments of 10 more tsunami warning sirens to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) in 2012 and 2019.

The procurement of these sirens could work with private sector through the enterprises' social corporate responsibility programs, he said.

Indonesia lies on the Circum-Pacific Belt, also known as the Ring of Fire, where several tectonic plates meet and cause frequent volcanic and seismic activities.

As a result, many parts of the archipelago, including Bali, are prone to earthquakes that frequently trigger tsunami, as could be observed from last year's deadly earthquakes in Palu, and the districts of Donggala and Sigi, Central Sulawesi Province.

Throughout 2018, Indonesia was hit by a total of 11,577 earthquakes, including several of them that caused serious casualties, with the number significantly increasing as compared to that in 2017.

According to Head of the Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) Dwikorita Karnawati, several of the events related to the earthquakes that had hit Indonesia last year were never witnessed before.

They could be observed from the liquefaction in Palu; tsunami that came earlier than the issuance of a tsunami warning in Palu; and the Sunda Strait Tsunami, she recently said.

The Sunda Strait Tsunami, which struck certain coastal areas of the provinces of Banten and Lampung following the eruption of Mount Anak Krakatau on Dec 22, 2018, killed 437 people and seriously affected the lives of several residents in the disaster zones.

ANTARA